Aces High Bulletin Board

General Forums => Hardware and Software => Topic started by: dracon on March 02, 2004, 11:38:38 PM

Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: dracon on March 02, 2004, 11:38:38 PM
Ok got to chose here?  Download and Upload speeds are identical for both.

What I have heard...

Cable:  More users, Speed decreases.

DSL:  How can to twisted copper wires be better than the 1/4" shielded wires used in cable?

Q please?  Will I see a difference between the two in Ping/Hops/Packet Loss to AH servers?

Thanks,
Dracon
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: SOB on March 03, 2004, 12:02:49 AM
At the same up/down speeds, if price isn't a consideration, I'd choose the DSL over the cable any day of the week.  If price is a consideration - and it is for me - I would and did go with cable.  My cable connection runs fantastic and I have no complaints - except the occasional outage which is usually short.  Your experience will definitely depend on your provider and how many other users are sharing your bandwidth.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Skuzzy on March 03, 2004, 07:32:05 AM
Generally speaking DSL is a better choice than cable for several reasons.

Cable
1)  Shares the physical medium with all your neighbors who also have it.  This immediately exposes your computer to theirs and vice-versa.
2)  Because the physical medium is shared, there is no way to control how the bandwidth is being spread out.  Simply put, it is possible for one person on a node to kill the performance of everyone else on that cable.
3)  The physical medium of cable is not required by law to be maintained.  I have a sheared cable in my back yard which has been that way for a year.

DSL
1)  Sharing of the connection occurs in the telephone switch, which is load balanced so all users get a fair shot at getting service to the packet.
2)  Because their is no physical sharing of the medium, you are instantly protected from the immediate visibilty to your neighbor.
3)  The physical phone line is protected by law and phone companies are required to keep it maintained within specific time periods.  The time period varies by state, but is generally around 24 hours for response time (residential line), less if it is a trunk line.


Given the same speed and equal price, DSL is usually the better choice.  However, the ISP is also part of the equation.  This is where things tend to break.  If the ISP does a poor job, the physical choice of which medium to use becomes moot.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: dracon on March 03, 2004, 11:42:56 AM
Ok Thanks......

Yep the price is with in 2 dollars per month so no object.  Here, in Idaho, I have Cableone.net /The old @Home for cable and QWEST for DSL!

Cable quoted me: 500/126 $46/month
DSL quoted me: 640/256 and expect 80% or 512 for $44/month

Since it wasn't addressed, I presume that Ping, Hops, and Packet Losses, are  not controllable by either source?

The DSL provider actually said, "Should things change in the future, you would be upgraded to 1.5 Mbps for no cost."  I presume this means a change in the phone system, My line or Switching?

Thanks...I ordered the DSL today!
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Pfunk on March 03, 2004, 11:56:08 AM
Wow thats awfully expensive for such slow speeds, I get 2000/256 for $29.99
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Roscoroo on March 03, 2004, 12:07:04 PM
location is why ... at my dad in eastern wash. they dont have dsl or cable options ... there still paying 20 sumptin per for 56k

P.s there really isnt really much diff  in the ping times ... as for they use the same relays ect to get ya there .

Just beshure that they dont have a bandwith/transfer amount  alotment per month .
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Pfunk on March 03, 2004, 01:22:14 PM
Quote
Originally posted by dracon
Ok Thanks......

Yep the price is with in 2 dollars per month so no object.  Here, in Idaho, I have Cableone.net /The old @Home for cable and QWEST for DSL!

Cable quoted me: 500/126 $46/month
DSL quoted me: 640/256 and expect 80% or 512 for $44/month

Since it wasn't addressed, I presume that Ping, Hops, and Packet Losses, are  not controllable by either source?

The DSL provider actually said, "Should things change in the future, you would be upgraded to 1.5 Mbps for no cost."  I presume this means a change in the phone system, My line or Switching?

Thanks...I ordered the DSL today!


You might want to see if other providers service your area, that is alot of $$$$ for not alot of speed

http://www.dslreports.com
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Skuzzy on March 03, 2004, 01:39:57 PM
It's a state thing pf.  768/128k DSL, here in Texas, will run $40/month or so.  Cable is more.  Texas has one of the weakest Public Utilites Commissions in the U.S.
They will roll over for whatever the utlity companies want.  When TXU bought Lone Star Gas (which was making a tidy profit) they requested a 200% increase for natural gas prices to customers and the PUC gave it to them.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: dracon on March 03, 2004, 02:13:36 PM
Gents.....

I'm lucky to have either, let alone a choice~~  I could be bangin' two rocks together or using two cups and a string.

We are what you'd call.........REMOTE ;)

Get this: Satellite is 98/month

Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: DAVENRINO on March 03, 2004, 06:27:31 PM
Earthlink cable in Hawaii is $41/month but also includes unlimited dialup which is useful for laptop off-island.  My cable tests at 3300/356 to LA using DSL Reports.

DJ229
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Reschke on March 03, 2004, 08:03:54 PM
Had a huge problem here with Bellsouth ADSL for about 6 months and decided that for $49.99 a month before "taxes" I was getting screwed for 1.5Mbps/256Kbps. So on Dec. 31st Charter came on board for $29.99 with 3Mb both ways till May 1st. Then if I still want the 3Mb cable it goes up to $39.99. I will be sticking with the higher speed. Bellsouth also had the cable television here for me and they lost that as well when they decided to raise their cost and reduce the channel lineup to "compete" with Charter. For about $15 a month more I now have Digital cable instead of the expanded basic service I did have.

The problem with my ADSL was that they would go offline from Thursday till either Sunday night or Monday morning and they kept telling me that someone had to be "turning a microwave dish" in my direction for the problem to continue. The funny thing is that my neighbor and several other friends had ADSL in the neighborhood and they weren't experiencing problems. However my boss had the same service but lives about 15 minutes from me and during the same time they had the same problem. I had been a very loyal ADSL customer for over 4 years at that time.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: CAV on March 03, 2004, 08:29:25 PM
Quote
Here, in Idaho, I have Cableone.net /The old @Home for cable and QWEST for DSL!



I am in Idaho too. I was with QWEST DSL... the DSL was OK, when it was running.... but QWEST support just sucked. On cableone now so far so good and is running great.

CAV
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Thorns on March 03, 2004, 08:57:05 PM
I have Comcast getting 2950 kbps down, and 246 kbps up...works for me!  

Thorns
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: dracon on March 03, 2004, 09:04:55 PM
So CAV........Where are you??  I am in Blackfoot, East side between Idaho Falls and Pocatello.

I am getting the DSL, which is QWEST through OneWest.  Here's the deal $99 dollar activation waived by QWEST.  $25 activation waived by OneWest.  1st month free.  I have nothing to lose here.  So so far so good.

Thanks again for all the feedback/advice.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Blammo on March 04, 2004, 08:39:35 AM
I have been using ADSL through Bellsouth since 2001.  No complaints here.  I consistently get 1200+ on the downside and 250 to 300 on the upside (like I upload that much anyway).  The only time I had a service interruption was after moving to a new house and that was 6 months after I moved and had been getting DSL for $5 during that time :aok

I've had people try to tell me to go with cable, but everyone I know personally that has it has had terrible service, unexplained down times, widely fluxuating bandwidths (throughput), and other issues.  This may not be every cable user's experience, but it has been the experience of those I know.

Anyway, I'll keep my ADSL! :D
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Halo on March 04, 2004, 04:54:03 PM
Depends on what's available in your area.  In National Capital Area, Comcast does great for me:  max download speed 3.23 megabit/sec and max upload speed 224.04 kilobit/sec.  

Speed test via YourSpeed v.2.3 on Internet.  Has throughputs of 704 Kbps and 88,023 Bytes per sec.   Cable is clear winner in our area, much faster than comparable phone max.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: LAWCobra on March 04, 2004, 05:14:12 PM
Getting around 3.8 down and 384 up comcast cable.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Skuzzy on March 04, 2004, 05:14:53 PM
That's a bit slower than I get on my DSL connection Halo, but sounds pretty realistic, given the aggregate bandwidth available over the Internet.  Last mile starts becoming a non-issue once you get above about 1Mb/s as the Internet is the bottleneck then.

Comcast is our local cable too Halo.

Routing is somewhat controlled by the ISP.  It depends on the number of pipes and connections the ISP has.

Cable networks are laid out much like AOL, where they have Internet connections spread throughout the country and each WAN covers a large regional area.  It is not unusual to see 6 or 7 hops in a trace inside the cable network before reaching an Internet gateway router.
DSL providers tend to be more localized, except for the very large DSL providers, which use a network topology much like Cable.

Normally you will have fewer hops with DSL than Cable, but not always.  Again, the ISP is the key to that.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Nilsen on March 04, 2004, 05:27:09 PM
I have cable, and it is always stable... everytime i do a dl/upload check its within 1-2% of the speed i pay for. Pingtimes are aslo low.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Skuzzy on March 04, 2004, 05:43:23 PM
Downloads are sometimes misleading as they are probably coming from a caching applicance within the local ISP's network.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: CAV on March 04, 2004, 05:45:09 PM
Quote
So CAV........Where are you??



Boise... I work at the airport for TSA.

CAV
Title: tampabay roadrunner
Post by: Eagler on March 04, 2004, 06:10:32 PM
331.13 KBps (http://us.mcafee.com/root/genericURL_genericLeftNav.asp?genericURL=/root/speedometer/test_0600.asp&genericLeftNav=/en-us/wrapper/catalog_nav.asp)

great system, as I have said in the past - both tv & comp
Title: Re: tampabay roadrunner
Post by: DAVENRINO on March 04, 2004, 06:42:01 PM
Quote
Originally posted by Eagler
331.13 KBps (http://us.mcafee.com/root/genericURL_genericLeftNav.asp?genericURL=/root/speedometer/test_0600.asp&genericLeftNav=/en-us/wrapper/catalog_nav.asp)

great system, as I have said in the past - both tv & comp


Hmm... reads faster with this test than DSL Reports.
Your Internet Connection
Speed Results
 
 
 
 
File Size:  600.005 KB  
Time Elapsed:  1.201 seconds

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
  3.903 Mbps
(499.59 KBps)  
 
 
 
 
DJ229
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: capt. apathy on March 05, 2004, 01:16:29 PM
I'm damn happy with my cable.  depending on which benchmark site I goto I'm getting between 2.5-3.9 down.

IMO you might want to take your neigborhood into account when deciding.  very few people in my imediate area are online and almost all of them are on dial-up, of the people I know (and the ones those talk to) I'm the only one around on cable, 1 or 2 others have dsl.  the bulk of the computer owners around here don't even have net access.

the end result is I never seem to take a hit from excessive traffic.
down time is much less than with dsl (4 hours in 2 years with cable, 2-3 hours a month with dsl), the cable is as much faster than the dsl as the dsl was faster than the 56k.  

I guess we're just lucky around here with comcast, I know a few others who have it in other parts of town and other parts of the state and all seem to be having simular results as me.

one thing that worries me is they will soon be offering cable phones at a cheaper rate than regular land lines.  if that catches on I suspect my speed will take a hit then
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: SNO on March 05, 2004, 04:49:45 PM
File Size:  600.005 KB  
Time Elapsed:  1.093 seconds

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
  4.289 Mbps
(548.95 KBps)  
 
 
This is with Comcast in Michigan. I had DSL it was nice but 1/3 as fast and ping times were 3 times what I have now, which is normal at 29ms to AH. Price was the same for either one.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: lasersailor184 on March 05, 2004, 09:25:14 PM
I get roughly what SNO gets from Comcast in SE pennsylvania.  Maybe a touch slower.
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: LAWCobra on March 06, 2004, 03:13:50 PM
Your Internet Connection
Speed Results
 
 
 
 
File Size:  600.005 KB  
Time Elapsed:  0.969 seconds

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
  4.838 Mbps
(619.2 KBps)
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Flit on March 11, 2004, 09:50:35 PM
2.542 Mbps
325.38 KBps
hehe the speed dial was pegged out
I love my cable (:
Title: Cable or DSL??
Post by: Flit on March 11, 2004, 09:53:19 PM
Then I look agian at the previous post's and see it's only half what y'all are gettin  ):