I have been getting a lot of questions concerning Internet access so I thought I'd create a page to answer some of the more common questions I've received.  It should be no secret, as can be seen from the content of this page, that I think the way to go for Internet service is DSL.

Modes of Internet Access

The three choices facing most people who want to access the Internet are by way of Dial-up service, DSL or Cable Modem.

Dial-up service is effected over a regular telephone line; that is, one in which you use a telephone to call your friends, neighbors, plumber, auto mechanic and the like.  You know the line is working if you hear dial tone when you pick up the phone.

The maximum speed allowable by law, I understand, is 53 KB even if you're using a 56K modem.  That would be 53 KB download and about 14KB upload.  The user can usually do the installation by himself with maybe a little help from his ISP tech support.

DSL, or, Digital Subscriber Line, comes to you over a pair of copper wires just like your dial tone line from your local phone company Central Office (CO).   The phone company usually takes one of your dial tone lines and converts it to DSL service and your dial tone will piggy-back on the DSL; that is, part of the bandwidth is used to carry the dial tone line.

Once your phone line has been converted for DSL, if you pick up the phone before you've done anything else, you should get dial tone - even without using a filter or having setup your computer for the service. 

But even if you get dial tone and can call out, you don't know if the line is working correctly for DSL Internet access because dial tone is what you would normally expect to get if you pick up the phone.

I've had the situation where I helped a client setup her DSL line because she just couldn't get it to work no matter how closely she followed the instructions.  So in I stepped and lo and behold, I couldn't get it to work either.

This reduced me to calling tech support, and after spending about 10 minutes on the line with SBC's tech support people it was decided to check the phone number of the DSL line - that is, to start from scratch.  Turns out there was a miscommunication as to which of the client's lines was to be converted for DSL service.  Once I went to the line the SBC computer showed being setup for DSL, the installation of the client's equipment went without a hitch.

The point of this is DON'T HESITATE TO CALL TECH SUPPORT IF YOU HAVE TROUBLE SETTING UP THE SERVICE.  That's why your ISP's tech support people are there and they're usually very nice people who really know what they're doing.

But, outside of a fluke like that, most DSL setups go without a hitch.  If the setup goes okay, and everything is working correctly, you'll be able to access the Internet at the same time you're on a phone call.  The two don't interfere with each other.

BUT, MAKE SURE YOUR PHONES ARE WORKING THROUGH A FILTER.  If not, when the DSL is doing its thing, you will get a LOT of noise on your dial tone.  The filters prevent that.

The maximum speed you can expect on DSL, depending on what you've selected from the supplying Internet Service Provider (ISP) is about 8 MB download, 2 Meg upload.  Most subscribers get a DSL plan which will give them a max of 1.5 Meg download, and about 375K upload.

While DSL is fairly easy for the user to setup himself (or, again, with a bit of tech support help), if he wants, an ISP technician will come out and set it up for you, but, be advise that it could cost $200 to do so.

Cable Modem is the third and usually most expensive option.  It uses a digital signal accessed through a  coaxial cable from your cable TV company.  Not having any experience with this, I believe that it is possible for the user to set the whole thing up himself, again, with a cable company tech support person on the line if there's a problem, but that's something you'll have to check with your cable company on.

Relative Merits of Each

Dial-up Internet service can be had for free or you can pay a monthly subscription fee to companies such as AOL, Earthlink, MSN and the like.

Dial up is limited in its efficiency by the nature of the technology and by your distance from your local phone company Central Office (which holds true for DSL also and, I believe, for Cable Modem as well).

Another limiting factor is the resistance of the cables carrying the service to your premises.  The farther from the Central Office, the slower your system is going to respond, and, conversely, the closer, the faster.  If you've got good cable pairs from the Central Office to your premises without a lot of drag on the line from amplifiers and the like, then, at about a mile out (i.e., about 5000 feet) from the Central Office, you should get a pretty good speed in the neighborhood of about 50K.

A lot of people share the phone line with a talk or fax line and the computer.  The problem with sharing is that to fax you have to shut the computer down.  To talk, you have to shut the computer down.  To use the computer for the Internet, you have to stay off the line - no trying to call or fax someone.

The choice a lot of people make is to get a second phone line for the computer and the fax to share and if that gets to be a problem, a separate line altogether for either the computer or fax machine.

So, with Dial-up, you're paying a monthly charge for the phone line and if you subscribe to an Internet Service, you pay a monthly fee for that as well.

DSL is somewhat similar.  It comes over the telephone cables from your phone company Central Office to your premises.  As far as I'm aware, most of the DSL providers would like you to be no more than about 15 or 16,000 feet or so (about 3 miles) from the phone company Central Office for the DSL to work, or, work properly.  Again, the closer, the better and the faster the speed.  Close to the CO you might get 1.5 MB and, at the furthest, maybe only about 400K, which is not too shabby and is about 8 times the speed of a dial up at its best.  If you want to pay about $75 bucks a month, the provider might be able to give you service at 6 or 8 meg.

Where I live, you pay a monthly charge for the DSL service ($19.95 with SBC in my case) and you still pay for the dial tone service which piggy-backs on the DSL.  This amount is about $15 or so a month for a total of about $35 a month.  For a comparison, that's what I was paying for my Earthlink dial-up service which made switching to DSL a no-brainer.  At the present time, mid 2005, SBC is offering DSL for $14.95 a month for a year's contract.  At $30 bucks a month, I think, all in all, it's a good deal.

Cable Modem, I think, is way overpriced and decidedly overkill.  Most people don't do anything but surf the WWW - which means they're downloading.  DSL at 1.5 meg is more than most people will ever need.  Few people upload to websites so you don't need Cable Modem's speed in uploading.  For the overwhelming majority of users, the service is a definite waste of money.

As a for instance, when I created this website, I was using dial-up and I had to wait a bit for the material to upload to the ISP's server for the site.  Now, with DSL, even at 1.5 meg, the upload at around 375 KB is virtually instantaneous.  I've recently converted to a 3 MB DSL service with SBC for an additional $5 bucks a month and my upload speed is about 750 KB.  Waiting is not an issue.

Now there are other things you can do with Digital Service from you Cable TV company such as telephone lines over their service besides the stuff for your TV.

You've got several things to weigh when considering the type of service you need, or, want.  While Cable Modem essentially can do it all, the larger consideration may be price and prices vary with the different types of services. 

But, we're basically considering DSL here, so I'll continue with comments on that.  When you contact the DSL provider they usually will send you a DSL modem and some phone equipment filters along with connecting modular cables and a transformer to power the modem along with a setup CD and a directions booklet. 

In the case of SBC where I live, the filters they sent also included one for a wall phone.  If you don't use the filters, you will probably get a lot of static noise on your telephones and fax machine.  The pictures on this page show the types of filters you can expect to receive.  The last picture is a jury-rig I did to use a standard table phone jack (RJ11C) filter with a wall phone.  It works without any trouble but I'm sure the DSL provider would like the filter to come off the jack directly rather than 25 or 30 feet in the wire to the jack.  But, as they didn't supply the filter (ISP was not SBC), any port in a storm, right?

In most applications I think it is safe to say you will only have one telephone line on the jack.  In this picture you will notice the device has two ports.  Not all filters have two ports.  Some only have the one for the telephone line device such as a fax machine, cordless phone base unit or standard table phone.

In this example, the right port which says "phone" is for, what else, your phone or fax machine or whatever.  The one on the left which should say "DSL/HPN" is for the cord to the DSL modem.

Cable Modem service has the advantage of being very fast and the upload / download speed is, I believe, the same in both directions.  I have been told by Cable TV technicians that, theoretically, you can gets speeds of 8 - 10 MB, both up and down stream.  That being said, I have also been told that in practical reality your speed will probably more likely in the 2 - 3 MB range and that how fast things are depends on how many people are online in your Node - which is what they call the service area you're in.  You're not in a Node with DSL so your speed remains constant.

Costs

Besides what I mentioned above, the costs obviously vary for the different services.  A dial-up line in some areas costs as little as $20 a month.  Your Internet service perhaps another $20-25 a month.

The cost for DSL is coming down.  In my area SBC is offering DSL for $19.95 a month for a year and I believe after that you'll be able to renew it at that price for another year. (At the present time [June, 2005], SBC is offering DSL for $14.95 a month for a year)

The rate was recently lowered from $26.95 a month which was a very good rate and was good for the whole year.  For several years now, despite other ISPs providing DSL at $40 to $50 dollars a month, SBC had been letting people renew at the $26.95 rate for about two or three years now.  I don't see any reason to think that won't be the case with the current rate of $19.95 a month.

Besides the DSL service, the dial tone that rides on part of the bandwidth of the DSL will cost you probably about another $15 - $20 a month for a total around $40 for a line from SBC.  A very good rate considering what other companies are charging.  DSL rates go up depending on the speed you want topping off at around $80 a month for speed of 8 MB.  Much faster downloading than your probably going to get with Cable Modem, especially if you have a lot of people on line in your Node.

Speaking of that, with Dial-up, you're on the line by yourself.  The same is true for DSL, so you won't see a reduction in speed.  But when you have Cable Modem, you're lumped into an area with others and your speed changes accordingly with how many people are online with you.

And, I think for Cable Modem you're going to pay around $50 a month at least for the service - again depending on where you are.

If you're going to be doing a lot of uploading, then Cable Modem might be for you.  But if your not and you're going to be visiting a lot of graphic intensive websites, DSL may be just the ticket for you.  And, of course, if you don't mind waiting, you can stick with dial-up.

Another thing to consider.  Internet service access is very competitive.  If you have a contract rate for your DSL at a given price and you notice a competitor offering the service for less, mention to your ISP, once your contract has expired, that you can get the service from such-and-such a company for a lesser rate.  This happened to a client recently who previously had Internet access from SBC.  Having to call SBC for an unrelated problem, they tried to sell him DSL from SBC.  When the client mentioned he had service from SBC before and switched providers, the Service Rep at SBC had asked why.  The client said because the competing rate was cheaper.  Guess what the SBC Rep told him, "Well, we would have given you the service at the same rate if you had called us."

So, it's obvious that the ISP would like to keep you at the reduced rate than NOT have you as a customer at all.  So it pays to ask if they can give to you at the competitor's rate.  If they can, then that'll save you all the trouble of changing email addresses and contacting everyone to let them know you've switched.  So don't be afraid to ask.  Oh, this client is now back with SBC at the lower rate and is quite satisfied.

And lastly, this tidbit.

Most DSLs one is liable to encounter are those lines which were converted to DSL using a customer's dial-up line.  In this process, the dial-up is converted to DSL and dial-tone piggy-backs on the DSL.

Well, that's about it.  For questions about the various services' rates, check with the vendors.  If you have any questions, send me an email or give me a call and I'll see if I've got an answer for you.