DSL vs cable.

wojo

wojo

Well-known member
ok so i am trying to save money and was wondering how much of a difference there really is between these 2 for internet service.i ahve a mac and have always used cable but verizon has a great deal on rigt now and i was thinking of switching opinions please.i am more worried about speed as i use itunes and limewire
 
Hey Wojo, I have had cable since the beginning and the price has NEVER come down. They know that you'll pay a premium for the good sh!t. Having used both, there is no comaprison as to the superiority of cable. I'd sooner give up other things if I had to make a choice.
 
wojo said:
ok so i am trying to save money and was wondering how much of a difference there really is between these 2 for internet service.i ahve a mac and have always used cable but verizon has a great deal on rigt now and i was thinking of switching opinions please.i am more worried about speed as i use itunes and limewire
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It depends on how close you are to a central office. Within 18,000 feet is usually the limit, but the closer the better. With DSL you have a direct connection, that stays the same throughput., its your own connection. With Cable you share bandwith with others on your network segment. So at times of high usage perfomance and speed will slow way down. With DSL you won't have this problem. Cable may offer higher actual speeds but you won't necessarily reach those speeds. The thing is if you are close to a central office, I would get a DSL connection, if you are farther away than choose cable....Or you could try fios, if its available in your area...very expensive though.
 
T-Bone said:
It depends on how close you are to a central office. Within 18,000 feet is usually the limit, but the closer the better. With DSL you have a direct connection, that stays the same throughput., its your own connection. With Cable you share bandwith with others on your network segment. So at times of high usage perfomance and speed will slow way down. With DSL you won't have this problem. Cable may offer higher actual speeds but you won't necessarily reach those speeds. The thing is if you are close to a central office, I would get a DSL connection, if you are farther away than choose cable....Or you could try fios, if its available in your area...very expensive though.
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yea i ahd always heard that about cable that u shar bandwidth so i always wondered how much of a advantage i really had..
 
Do you have/want cable TV? That's usually part of a package deal also. I went with DSL (Qwest) and combined all my phone packages 'tho I do have Verizon cell phone. I also don't watch that much TV anymore (reformed TV addict still struggling one season at a time...LOL) so the cable was much more expensive for me.
 
T-Bone said:
With Cable you share bandwith with others on your network segment. So at times of high usage perfomance and speed will slow way down.
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While I've read that this is true, there has not been one moment over the past 5 years when I noticed ANY decline in speed or performance and I live in NYC.
 
Bionic said:
While I've read that this is true, there has not been one moment over the past 5 years when I noticed ANY decline in speed or performance and I live in NYC.
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Well that could be because you live in NYC and I would guess that your cable providers network is extremely segmented, therefor making it less of a problem. On the other hand, if you live say in a small city or town.....Then maybe its more of a problem...I say if you are close enough to a central office, choose DSL, but farther away than pick Cable....Plus price plays into also. I say just choose the one thats going to get you the best deal for the best performance. If you are farther from a city or big town choose cable. If you are in a city and close to central office choose DSL, but only if its a better deal. Just because you pay for 10Mb/sec doesn't mean thats the bandwidth you will recieve. Most routers have area where you can check your bandwidth, just check and see if the actual numbers match up.
 
Not had any speed related problems with cable... you can get much greater speeds with cable in general than you can with DSL.
 
Ive had both and enjoy the cable much more, and the package deals that are out there now you cant go wrong ph. net. tv. $99.00 a month. My old home phone bill was at least that most of the time.
 
I have dsl at work and cable at home. Both are fast but work (dsl) drives me nuts with how slow it is compared to my home connection (in reality, it's only an extra couple seconds I have to wait but I've grown accustomed to the high speed at home).
 
I have had both and feel the difference is insignificant except there is a large cost savings with DSL. Especially with some Direct TV packages.
 
yea thats what i have found out talking to people in this area im going to give it a try,plus the mac is faster anyway than a pc in my experience (hell i loaded windows on a partition on my hd and windows runs faster on my mac then my work comp)..i'll report back..appreciate all the help
 
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