Different types of Broadband?

[paulobrad]

Can someone explain the different types of broadband please? I know there are 2 main types, ADSL (the one where your exchange has to be upgraded) and one with Telewest which comes down cable. How do they compare in terms of speed of connection and cost?

[wizard]

ADSL is, as you say, the one where your telephone exchange needs to be upgraded. This is the most common version of broadband as it is widely available and the most easy to set up. This is the version where you normally get about 650kbs, pretty fast! This is about �25 a month or something for the fastest BT have to offer with a free ADSL modem and �99 set up fee. Telewest is usually used for people who cant access broadband but are in a covered area e.g. down a private road. This is about the same as ADSL in terms of monthly costs but it only seems to reach speeds of about 500kbs, still fast though! Problem is, they do cost quite a lot to install because in the case of living up a private road, they have to run a cable all the way up the street from the nearest telegraph exchange, quite a nuisance and quite expensive! Hope this helps!

[j2buttonsw]

Cable comes down a co-ax cable into a cable modem and you can purchase various bandwidths: 128 k, 256 k, 512 k or 1024 k (1 M). This is not strictly true as the 512 k is tweeked up to 600 k. In theory, you can bet much higher bandwidths 5 M or more. Suffice to say the bigger the bandwidth the higher the price. As it uses a seperate cable (one that is often shared with your cable television channels) your landline phone is also available. Many companies supply it (NTL and Telewest being two) and it depends on whether you have a cable infrastructure in your area as to its availability. The bandwidth is shared so if you have the whole street on it your overall bandwidth will decrease. I pay about �25 per month for a 600 k connection plus an initial installation cost. I've had it for nearly 2 1/2 years and could not live without it. It is always on so you do not have a dial-up connection. ADSL (or asynchronous digital subscriber line) is pretty similar except you don't have a cable as the digital signal is piggy-backed over your existing telephone line. You require a modem or an ADSL router to coinnect to your computer. Once again you can choose the bandwidth you want up to similar values to cable (4 M, I think). Once again, it is always on, but it requires a dial-up to initiate the connection. ADSL is more expensive and arguably less reliable but it is much more available. All BT exchanges can be upgraded to support ADSL but whether they do so depends on demand. I beleive a 512 k ADSL connection costs around �35. Another advantage of ADSL is that you can purchase a static IP address which means you can host your own web sites from your home computer, but since public IP addresses are getting rarer the cost is pretty high. As the ADSL signal is different to your telephone signal, you can share the line and use each one simultaneously. There are other types of broadband (T1 lines, satellite links, kilostream lines etc) but they are out of the reach of most home users.

[lisaj]

Both the above answers are correct except for some of the details. 512K ADSL can be had for �18/mth from one of the top ISPs, not �35. ADSL has a higher outbound bandwidth (important if you're sharing anything) or 256K (versus 128K outbound for the standard 512K cable service). You don't need to purchase a static IP address. Many ISPs give this to you free, based upon the fact that you're likley to be connected the whole time anyway. Some (such as mine) give you up to 4 static IP addresses free. Cable is reported to have lower ping times - that is responsiveness - though I've seen NO evidence of this. The choice for each depends on your future intentions. Cable can be ramped, as j2 says, up to 10Mbps. This can be done easily as per demand by the cable operator. Upgrading is easy for you and would involve simply paying more. ADSL comes in various flavours, VHDSL being a 155Mbps symmetric variant (The A stands for assymmetric, meaning different speeds in either direction). You can rest assured that BT will (eventually) roll out ADSL products to match whatever the competition does, and the technology does allow phenomenal speeds so their expansion is basically limited by their incompetence. Unfortunately, BTs incompetence is basically why we have such a saga in this country - take S.Korea as an example, where nearly everyone in the country can get an 8Mb symmetric connection for $33/mth - All it took was $2bn of government investment.

[lisaj]

Have a look at http://www.adslguide.org.uk - it should answer everything you want to know