Upgrade: DSL or Cable? How to network?

I have Road Runner cable connection, and I love it. It is bundled with my cable TV bill, and I believe that I got a discount because I already had the cable TV when I got the Road Runner. I don't know very much about DSL, although I believe that it may not be as fast as cable.

I found a good article to help you determine which service is better for you:

http://www.cnet.com/internet/0-3762-8-20697067-1.html

Do you have XP? If you do, here's an article right from the horse's mouth, which may help!
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/using/howto/homenet/buildit.asp

DSL or Cable
Howdy:

This question has been ongoing for quite some time.. Theoretically, cable is supposed to be faster.. BUT, and this is a big but, the number of people using cable (tv and broadband) in your area has alot to do with your speed.

If you were the only person on that cable leg, then your speed would be fantastic.. However, as you turned on your tv, another computer, other people turned on their tv's and computers, you would quickly notice a reduction in your speed. Reason: They are using the bandwidth and the more that turn or logon, the slower you will get. NEVER as slow as dialup though.

As for DSL, you can sign up for a multitude of download and upload speed options.. Mine is 1500 down and 128 up. This will NEVER change.. My actual download and upload speeds aren't quite that (1415 down and 109 up) but they remain consistent no matter how many people are using the phone or are logging onto the net.. including my own network. My phoneline is mine alone and no one else can take any bandwidth from it...

As far as networking is concerned, www.practicallynetworked.com is about the best tutorial site I have found for this.

Good luck,
Murray

I use a dsl connection hooked up to my local phone line. You can add more computers to the dsl connection by buying new boxes for each computer (prolly a way to get around that...). I was on a wireless cable connection for quite some time. I haven't seen much difference in computer speed. But, I don't do a lot of downloading.

Murray,

Some DSL plans offer guaranteed speeds and some don't. I have used a few DSL services that did vary in speed.

lil'k,

The way to get around it is to network your puters.

Speed
Craven:

My phone company is my DSL provider also and the only one in my province. They offer different packages as far as upload and download speeds are concerned and price varies with the option.

Because it is the phone company and we can bundle our phone service with the broadband option, broadband becomes very affordable.. about $40.00 Canadian ($25 US) a month for the speeds I mentioned earlier.

I will live with it.

Murray

It is indeed a good price. While in Brazil I would pay for any DSL connection, most places in Brazil do not yet offer it and I was grateful to have it.

Well, here in Germany, DSL is provided by one telphone company and sold be diverse providers.

I'm on flatrate by AOL (768/128 = actually up a lot more, down about 120), no limits, for 19.80 EUROs = ~22.30 $

I wouldn't change at all.

Scary Part
Craven:

The scary part is, they could drop the download speed and up the price and I would probably still pay it.. Can't ever see myself going back to dialup !!

Murray

Dialup is hell.

I'm using the local cable company and have between 5 and 7 puters at anyone time right now there are 5 running. I have the cable modem to a router (firewall), to a 24 port switch to each puter. My speeds vary but I generally think it's working pretty good when I can download a 4 meg song in 9 seconds, but when everyone in the household is on line it takes 12 seconds. In December there were only 30 people on my leg. Someone else can do the math

I have dialup and I hate it, but since there is nothing else available in my area, I'm stuck with it. If cable or DSL ever come this way, I'll be all over it like a wet t-shirt ;-)

you should look into something like www.starband.com

Husker
Thanks for the link. I checked it out, but unfortunately it won't work in my area :-(

I had dsl for a brief time. It was the MSN service through the local phone company. It was fine when the modem didn't need to be jumped, which was several times a day, but I don't regret going back to dial up. We have wireless at work. It's great. It's great, but a single user would pay over USD 60.00/month, and the installation is way high.

The company I use for dialup recently sent me an announcement that it now offers cable service -- "for as little as $39.95 (US)/month!"

I went to their site and checked it out. The only thing available for my address is $145.00/month, $225 for the cable box, $200 for installation, installation required.

I'm sticking with my $9.95/mo. dialup, thanks.