My husband’s company will pay for high speed internet at home (they’re only too happy to make the 24 hour work day a reality for him:). We’re still working from a dial up connection. Don’t give me sh*t about it; it keeps me from checking that male horror show called The Hottie Thread. I used to check it periodically at work; it always seemed to give me a little too much insight into the male psyche. But I digress. Anyway, I have a cable hook up and a phone hook up in my study. I’ve heard terms like cable modem, DSL, high speed internet bandied about. What does it all mean? What should I get? Do I get it through my phone company or through my ISP? Right now, I have a TV hooked up to the cable outlet, and the phone jacks are right beside the desk.
Here you go, Amy.
Everything you wanted to know and more…
It doesn’t really matter which one you pick.
DSL stands for digital subscriber line - it uses a high frequency signal through the phone line, which then gets translated by a DSL modem. The only disadvantage I can see (and I have it) is that speeds tend to be proportionate to your distance from your local switching station, so if you live in a relatively spread out area, this could be an issue. I live in NYC, so distance is not an issue for me.
Cable modems give you similar or higher speeds through your cable coaxial line. The potential issue is that the cable network was originally designed to distribute from a central trunk line to many - so in areas the upload speed (from you to the internet) can be limited by how much traffic you are experiencing in your local area. The other issue I have is that you’d be buying your internet service from a local monopoly, and I hate the cable company slightly more than I hate the phone company.
It doesn’t matter whether you buy from your local cable/phone or an ISP - either way, it’s going through the same lines, and the third-party is leasing the rights to sell the line to you from the actual owner. So you should go for the best deal.
The other option which is coming about now is fiber-optic to the door. That will give you the best speeds and is apparently quite cost-effective. It’s an important option because in the near future you’re going to see a lot more content delivery through fiber-optic lines because of their capacity - HDTV video, phone, and internet through one line, for instance. But availability is limited right now.
Where the connection is not all that important anymore, because worst comes to worst, you could fairly easily set up a wireless network to service it. And the cable outlet can be split to run both TV and internet, just as the phone jacks can be as well.
Hope that helps.
Many people will tout the speed advantages of Cable Internet over DSL while others swear by DSL from the local telco. To be honest I think it is pretty much a wash but DSL is directly impacted by factors such as the age/quality of phone wiring as well as distance from the device that translates the signal in your area (SEN?) but both are effected by traffic load on the ‘wire’. If you live in an aera where everyone has a cable modem, then using cable internet for web access may be impacted. I recently had to cross the same bridge as well and it all came down to a couple simple factors: (A) cable has gone out a number of times over the last year where as I have never experienced any interuption with our local telephone service; (B) Local telco was running a special on DSL with self installation that resulted in 40% savings the first year of DSL service over similar access with a cable internet connection.
HINT…get the one with out a contract…
Okay, I’m going to add to the questions…
I have neither cable TV nor phone. My entertainment center is a portable DVD player, and my only phone is my cell phone.
It seems in my area that the better deal for ISP on cable is Earthlink, but they’re running through Comcast. One line in the agreement says that there can be additional fees from the carrier. So I can see it becoming just as expensive (if not more expensive) to go this route. And it bugs me to no end that they tack on a fee because you don’t have cable TV too (the so-called “multi-product discount”). Am I off base here?
And then there’s the issue of no phone. The apartment is wired, I just don’t use it. Would I need to get a phone number and live line just to go with DSL? Again I see that becoming just as expensive.
I know these are kind of irrelevant to the original questions (with the company paying, why worry about cost). But they’re important to me.
You are either going to have to get cable, or a phone…or just get a an Aircard, that is what I am on 99% of the time. Not super fast though - about ISDN speeds, a bit quicker.
I think you’ll have to contact both Comcast and your phone provider to get a better read on prices. I don’t know how much of a premium it would be, but it might end up being cheaper just signing up for local phone service to get the DSL and future fiber-optic.
Or you could just get a wireless G card and leech off a non-secure neighbor…
The apartment is wired, I just don’t use it. Would I need to get a phone number and live line just to go with DSL? Again I see that becoming just as expensive.
You know they do not specifiy what kind of line so see what the cost of the telco providers lowest cost phone option is and go that route. We use cell phones as well and use a 911 line at something like $5.45 a month but w/DSL, the bill runs about $52 a month after all of the inane line and municipal/city/state/federal access fees.
I’m pretty sure you are in the denver area right? I use Qwest DSL and it works great for me… I got thier cheapest plan and it is pretty damn fast and reliable for 99% of my needs. I didn’t go with the Qwest + MSN option because i thought that it wasn’t worth it to pay that much more just for email. I just went with the “pipe only” option which only gives you connectivity. I get email through icdsoft. You can get your own domain name (www.amyco.com) and an unlimited number of email addresses from them for like $4/mo.
Get on the web site of various DSL providers in your area , they will check your phone number on a map and for signal strength / type of wire. You will get an OK and in a week or so you will get a modem /cables /CD ,to get started.
They give you inline filters to connect to the phones ,these will let you be online and the phone at the same time . Comcast - SBC - others have deals 4 -12 months at $20 - $40
with SBC down to $14.95 if you get a 12 month deal .
I have read that people with long phone lines ( your the last house on the 10 mile dirt road ) have trouble as the closer you are to the main junction / fiber optic box , the better signal you have.
(Good )Cable will be faster than DSL , But after dial up , DSL will seem super sonic.
I work for a telco, so I’m probably biased. Suffice it to say that I have service from five utility providers: Telephone with DSL Water Power Cable (local channels only, had it disconnected recently) Satellite TV (Their addition of local channels caused the cable diconnect)
When hurricane Ivan came through all of these services were knocked out. The phone was back in 24 hours once they deployed a generator at our fiber SLIC. The water was back in three days, power in four. As soon as the computer booted, my DSL was up and running, and neighbors who had taken the time to run their computer on a generator reported that their DSL was working at the same time their phone came up. Cable was reconneced within a week, and of course satellite TV had worked the whole time, but was up last for me because i was so busy dealing with downed trees and work that it took me three weeks to straighten out the dish.
Of course, Hurricanes are probaly not a big problem in CO. But given the choice between cable and telco, I’d go telco, partly because I work for one, but mostly because NOBODY builds a network like the telcos do.