Thanks, guy.
You said cable is better, and son-of-a-poster it is.
I’d been holding back because I’d used faster lines on web browsing and saw no difference.
(SDMB is slow on every system, even the ones at NASA)
But you said download times made it worth it, and they do. I remembered your advice and took it.
I had been downloading Ravel’s Bolero (having just seen “10” again on the late movie).
For 16 minutes of playing time, I would have to wait 2-3 hours. But you can’t just leave and hope it will complete, you have to be at the computer when it bombs if you hope to recover.
Then, the Napster guys on the other end didn’t stay on line that long, and I got “transfer errors” three times after an hour’s wait. I gave up. (I needed my phone to talk on, even at night, even with the Message Center taking voice mail.)
On cable, downloading is such a breeze I’ll do a whole lot more of it. Freeware downloads are no longer a scheduling problem, but an easy decision. I can try a new utility out while I still remember what I wanted it for.
Ravel 2-3minutes, not hours. NeoPlanet browser skins (my hobby is collecting these) down to seconds.
And uploading gifs and jpegs (part of my business) is simply a lot safer when it’s done while you watch. No more "the old file’s gone, but the new one arrived incomplete and invisible.
I’m still waiting for our ever slow cable company to build the infustructure over here.
And of course as I wait, the phone line quality gets ever worse. I have a 56K modem that averages a connection speed of 26.4K.
It took me three months to convince the phone company that there was a problem.
yup, cable rocks. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven when my mom bought me a calbe box modem fror my computer, for me to use in MY room (instead of hiking down to the basement den). It’s so fast, and porn-um, I mean, websites, load so much faster.
Like any good ad, that there is a bit of an exaggeration. A cable modem setup is like a Local Area Network in which if you have more people connected and online, the slower the net becomes. However speeds will not drop drastically because your neighbor decides to go video downloading. The biggest slowup will still come from the internet itself right now.
I went and asked Yahoo![sup]TM[/sup] if they could explain better (because I can’t. All I do is play with the cable modem setup at CompUSA) and they sent me to a good article in Salon magazine about the differences between the two.
actually, the slowup with cable only happens if others in your neighborhood are using cable as well from the same isp as you. Then if you were to all be on at the same time you might notice a difference. Really though, thats not a problem, but a usefule tactic for DSL companies to pit against cable.
I have DSL, and it rocks. But it has issues as far as how far away from the isp’s site you have to be before you can get a decent bandwith. I download at 734k, and upload at 328k. That kicks some a$$. And it’s only costing me $50/month. I think cable runs about the same. Either way, until fiber optic cables are laid out everywhere, we can only dream of the norm being for every household to take in 1Mbps. Ahhhh, online gaming will be KING!
God bless the modern age, and broadband.
You said
"actually, the slowup with cable only happens if others in your neighborhood are using cable as well from the same isp as you. "
Does that mean I need an ISP as well? And pay twice?
I thought the cable company is the ISP. It’s a monopoly isn’t it, there’s only one per town?
Just like any ISP, if you have DSL, or Cable, or a dial-up, you must pay an access fee. I pay for my DSL line charge, and I pay about $20 for access(ISP) fees.
I signed up for DSL a couple of weeks ago with Earthlink, got my Ethernet card and have just received my freebie modem from Earthlink, with a hookup date of Wednesday.
They have a “simple self-install” program rather than sending anyone out to hook me up, so I have to do it myself. I am not looking forward to that; I hate hardware.
Glad you’re happy. Get ready to become a speed snob. If I find something on Napster, I won’t download it from someone with a dial up unless thats the only one available. I go down the list looking for cable, DSL or ISDN first. Quick downloads spoil you fast.
weirddave & CanadianSue - Right again. Speed snob it is. I’m not ashamed to say it. (Why act sophisticated and claim you’re a Power User? It’s not about power, but letting the id have it’s fun.)
