ASDL vs Cable

I'd like your opinions on the pros and cons of each.

I have been on a cable modem for about four years and have been very happy with the service. Way back when we were still on the @home network there were slight problems with connection to the net periodically cutting out for a few minutes here and there but since my local cable company took over the service there is never ever any interruption in service.

My housemate whose computer is networked to mine wants to switch our service to ASDL because it is about half the cost per month and because they have no limit on downloads and uploads (some of you might remember me freaking over the cable co. contacting me about excessive usage because he'd had Kazaa wide open and people were uploading movies from his computer).

I just dunno what to think. I love my cable!

Medaena

[Barandis]

Yay! I always answer these things over the years.

I have had cable three times now, and DSL once. I also sold DSL for US West back in the day, so I've been pretty close to all of it.

DSL

Advantages:

• A private line. A DSL line is shared with no one between your home and the telco's central office. This is an obvious security advantage.
• Constant speed. Though telcos do not guarantee DSL speed, you can count on it not dropping far below the stated speed even in the worst of circumstances.
• Choice of ISPs. Generally speaking, there are several ISPs in larger cities that offer DSL access.

Disadvantages:

• Constant speed. Though you can count on good speed with DSL, you can also count on not getting more speed without paying for it.
• Lack of availability. Though this isn't so much a problem as before, there is still a distance limit between your home and the CO.
• Pricing. This is highly subjective...DSL was actually cheaper in Phoenix than cable was. Where I live now, DSL is more expensive. But cable often has package deals that lower the total price if you get digital cable or phoen with them as well.

Cable

Advantages:

• Speed. Though the speed is highly variable, unless there are many cable users on your node, the speeds are higher than equivalently priced DSL.
• Availablity. In most places, if you can get digital cable (which is most places, nowadays), you can normally get cable Internet.
• Pricing. Though cable rates keep going up, with package deals, it is ften cheaper to have cable than DSL.

Disadvantages:

• Sharing. You share the cable line between your house and the cable CO with any number of others. Each additional cable user slows the overall speed,a nd it is possible for others to snoop private information. I was able to glean passwords from other computers in my area in Phoenix, and though this situation is much improved now, it is something to think about.
• Variable speed. Though the top speeds are higher, and generally speed is very good, if you are unlucky, DSL can be faster.
• No choice of ISP. Most of the time, you are forced to use the cable company as an ISP.

There. Your choice. Though...I just realized that I was answering this in the Community forum rather than the Computer forum.

[Aristotle]

[NOTE: Moved to the appropriate forum - Computers & Internet.]

In general, I always recommend DSL over cable. Shared bandwidth is crap in my opinion, and you are at the whim of how well the cable company sells cable modems.

In other words, they are motivated to give you a WORSE product because they want more people sharing it. In fact, the better your bandwidth, the less money the cable company is making, and thus the higher possibility of them thinking "screw that area."

The cable monopoly is also another thing I dislike. However, the telco monopoly on DSL is starting to get dangerous as well.

That being said, if your current broadband access is working well, is reliable, gives you all the speed you need/want, and you can afford it comfortably, I would say DON'T SWITCH.

There are so many subjective factors that make DSL or CABLE better in certain areas like: the infrastructure, the actual people working in your area, economic conditions, etc. Sometimes it is so hard to know in advance which one will actually WORK, that if you find something that is indeed working for you, keep it!

[Katidyd]

What is the comparision in terms of peripheral costs like equipment, security and software?

[Sebboe]

I've been lucky with my cable modem service.
When I lived in Pheonix, everyone in my neighborhood was
retired so I always has HUGE bandwith and stuff like Kazaa
was very fast.

Prior to that I had had both DSL and Cable in varioius places
and liked the cable better.

However, I now live in New Hampshire and the cable company
in my town is Adelphia. They don't have a POP in New Hampshire
so all traffic in routed to their POP in Vermont which is then all
sent down to Georgia which means the performance is totally
horrendous. Luckily I was given this information before getting
it.

I now have Verizon DSL which is defnitely a lot slower than
what I was used to with cable modem in other places but
in general I'm happy with it. I have a wireless network and
have 3 computers on it and its more than sufficient bandwidth
for the things I like to do. My complaint is that Verizon has
been unable to fix a problem with my phone which is that
all my calls sound really muffled if I have a DSL connection
at the time on the phone, which is always because my router
is what connects to the dsl and it doesn't hang up.

They do hear some line noise and are supposed to be fixing that
by Friday but I'm not sure if this is going to help.

The answer to this question is sort of "Depends"

As was posted above, you might have options.
If you call a DSL provider and give them your phone number
and street address they can usually tell you what your
upstream and downstream bandwith will be.

DSL in the home is almost always ADSL which is Asynchronous.
This means that your transfer rate for downloading files,
surfing the web, checking mail etc is differerent than uploading
files or people browsing a web-sever you are running.
What they typically do is give you fast downloads but limit
your upload speed. This wouldn't really mean anything to
someone who doesn't need data leaving their computer
and reaching other computers.

There are some opinions that this type of configuration goes
against the concept of the internet which is people being able
to talk to each other because it turns your computer into a
receiver more so than a receiver/transmitter.

The reality is that most cable and DSL providers don't want
you using a home service with a cheap price to be conducting
business. Many of them block ports that you would use for
a web server and the constant changing of dynamic ip addresses
they dole out makes it hard to keep name servers in synch
with your computer for people to point to www.yourdomain.com

Sebboe

[Kalo]

I have cable. When i get home from from my night-shift in the morning (7:30 AM eastern) the speed is very nice. As the day goes on, the overall responsiveness drops a bit, as does my ping when playing a net game.

I reliably download at 500k/sec from local servers and any of microsoft's (blazing fast) servers. Once i even topped off at just over 1000k/sec.

[Frobozz]

Sebboe there is actually a very easy way to fix that, however Verizon is a piece of shit. If you can switch to SBC they are freaking awesome, they actually care what the customer says and wants.

However you need a filter. SBC sent me 7 (for some odd reason) for free. So lemme know!

[Enosekel]

I've had DSL and cable.

I switched to cable because the phone companies in our city are all full of fucking evil bastards and I hate hate HATE dealing with them. I would like to kill them all. I even refuse to use anything but a cellphone anymore because they SUCK so bad, and life is so much more wonderful now that I don't have to deal with telephone company 'people'. Not to mention I no longer have 10 telemarketers from phone companies calling me every day trying to sell me more shitty services, because my cellphone isn't listed in any of their scumbag ass-sucking directories.

Ah, but since I switched to cable we have only had a few brief disruptions in service over the past 2 years (as opposed to, say, weeks of downtime during which we still had to pay for the DSL 'service') lasting about an hour or less and the customer service with our cable company is really good (as long as you don't mind holding the requisite 10-40 minutes for a rep, which seems the case with every megacorporation).

We don't have any limit on downloads or anything and our digital cable tv is included in the package. Now, I want to have cable tv anyway so this works out for me, but for people who don't get value out of their cable tv, this would be a rip off.

As for costs of setup, our cable modem came free and it cost about $25 at Best Buy for me to get the router and cables to connect all my computers. The cable company sets up the modem for you but doesn't officially set routers up, however they did for me for free and hooked me up with some free cable channels probably just cause the cable guy was cool

DSL for us was $150 to set up (not counting hub, etc.) plus our phone companies will NOT provide ANY technical support in setting up the modem, you're completely on your own despite that they promise someone will come out to set it up for you free when they're taking your money in the beginning. So. It took me a long time to figure out how to set up our DSL because I am definitely not some computer genius. A long fucking time. Dammit that pissed me off.

I've never had problems with too much traffic and cable. But who knows how it will be in a couple years. I've never had problems with their service or billing or anything, but who knows how things will be in a couple years when they've eliminated any possibility of competition for their customers.

[Kurgan]

Originally posted by Frobozz
Sebboe there is actually a very easy way to fix that, however Verizon is a piece of shit. If you can switch to SBC they are freaking awesome, they actually care what the customer says and wants.

However you need a filter. SBC sent me 7 (for some odd reason) for free. So lemme know!

I have no idea who SBC is, but ANYTHING is better than Verizon. I switched to a local ISP and have had nothing but good things to say about them. I hated calling Verizon and talking to someone in Florida when I am in Washington State. Now I talk to someone that I can go see face to face and get issues resolved. GO LOCAL!!

[Katidyd]

I was so happy to finally get a cable service. The first day alone I dl almost 12 gigs, sweet, just like they promised. Then all the days afterward has been a crawl. I'm currently downloading files at 2.4 kbs/sec on a cable modem. When I was on a dial-up it was 5.6 kbs/sec!

I feel so violated! Sorry for the rant.