I found out yesterday that my DSL service provided by Direct-tv-dsl ends on Jan. 16th - going out of business. Any recommendations on a good DSL provider? Would also be interested in pro/con of DSL vs Cable Modem. Thanks..............
<strong>I found out yesterday that my DSL service provided by Direct-tv-dsl ends on Jan. 16th - going out of business. Any recommendations on a good DSL provider? Would also be interested in pro/con of DSL vs Cable Modem. Thanks..............</strong><hr></blockquote>
A cable modem has a higher theoretical bandwidth than DSL, but it's shared bandwidth. If everyone in your neighborhood has a cable modem, and they're all downloading stuff, your connection with be extremely slow. But when you're the only one online, it's extremely fast. DSL is merely very fast, but it's consistently very fast. Make sense? Oh, and sometimes one is cheaper than the other, so be sure to compare rates before you decide.
I was in the same boat, went with Speakeasy.net. I've been *stunned* by their service so far, even though I haven't been switched over yet, and one call to them took care of *everything*, including the cancellation with DirecTV, the hell that is interacting with BellSouth (evil evil evil company), etc, etc. My expected down time? 1 hr.
They offered the features I need (static IP, etc), at a decent price. I'd recommend them so far, as an almost customer.
For instance: on their page for you to check on the status of your installation, they post the logs from interacting with Covad, BellSouth, etc, etc. You get to see up to the minute, what's going on, who's talking to whom, and what gets done next. *VERY* nice. Doesn't feel like a black hole that you throw your money into. (Are you listening BellSouth?)
Edit: Forgot to mention that Speakeasy.net has essentially made it as easy as possible for DirecTV orphans. There's a direct link on their homepage for us all, with a FAQ, ordering info, etc, and like I said above, they take care of it all for you. So far, so good.
Last month my cable modem had ALL kinds of problems. Yes, you get a faster theoretical speed, but my line also has a bandwidth cap. Also with the slow peak hours, frequent disconnections, and rate hikes, I am looking at DSL. My friend has DSL, and it loads pages faster than my cable. The worst was when the cable crashed on Christmas! No internet! (6.3K upload / 2K download later that day) Oh, I use At&t in the Bay Area.
I'll give my props to my DSL provider, EarthLink. I was a dial-up customer for a bit, then upgraded to DSL. I've been very happy with it (768 kbps down, 128 kbps up). It SHOULD be 1.5 Mbps down...but my local phone is Verizon and they won't let EarthLink give me full speed . However...very low pings and consistantly close to max speed (tests at 725 down and 135 up using several online speed tests. For some good consumer opinion, look at <a href="http://www.dslreports.com"; target="_blank">BroadbandReports.com</a>. Its a VERY good place to see whats available in your area and to see feed back from customers. Also a good place for tidbits of news about broadband in general.
Speakeasy rocks. I'm too far from a CO to get any kind of DSL service I'd want, but if I was in range, I would ditch my AT&T/Comcast cable connection in a heartbeat.
Verizon doesn't allow you to send mail out thru their servers unless its one of their email addresses. This won't mess up .mac stuff since apple supplies an smtp server. Verizon DSL is pretty cheap but they charge a 37.50 line charge if you go with someone elses DSL, so if your local phone service is thru verizon expect to pay 37.50 more for your DSL if you use someone other than them. Basically they have insured that they will always have the lowest priced service available in areas that they service.
They're great on customer service and the speeds are really pretty good. This is coming from AT&T Broadband (which was really, really fast. Stupid new apartment not having cable.)
I saved a few bucks and got the self-installation package that I was able to set up in 10 minutes.
Unless you're d/l movie-sized files, I doubt you'll see a difference between cable and DSL.
Comments
<strong>I found out yesterday that my DSL service provided by Direct-tv-dsl ends on Jan. 16th - going out of business. Any recommendations on a good DSL provider? Would also be interested in pro/con of DSL vs Cable Modem. Thanks..............</strong><hr></blockquote>
A cable modem has a higher theoretical bandwidth than DSL, but it's shared bandwidth. If everyone in your neighborhood has a cable modem, and they're all downloading stuff, your connection with be extremely slow. But when you're the only one online, it's extremely fast. DSL is merely very fast, but it's consistently very fast. Make sense? Oh, and sometimes one is cheaper than the other, so be sure to compare rates before you decide.
They offered the features I need (static IP, etc), at a decent price. I'd recommend them so far, as an almost customer.
For instance: on their page for you to check on the status of your installation, they post the logs from interacting with Covad, BellSouth, etc, etc. You get to see up to the minute, what's going on, who's talking to whom, and what gets done next. *VERY* nice. Doesn't feel like a black hole that you throw your money into. (Are you listening BellSouth?)
Edit: Forgot to mention that Speakeasy.net has essentially made it as easy as possible for DirecTV orphans. There's a direct link on their homepage for us all, with a FAQ, ordering info, etc, and like I said above, they take care of it all for you. So far, so good.
[ 01-04-2003: Message edited by: Kickaha ]</p>
EDIT: Some spelling
[ 01-04-2003: Message edited by: Ebby ]</p>
I.M. VanDeWaals
Of course, that's presuming you're in the verizon service area.
They're great on customer service and the speeds are really pretty good. This is coming from AT&T Broadband (which was really, really fast. Stupid new apartment not having cable.)
I saved a few bucks and got the self-installation package that I was able to set up in 10 minutes.
Unless you're d/l movie-sized files, I doubt you'll see a difference between cable and DSL.