Cable vs. DSL > That's utterly fascinating...

That's utterly fascinating...

I have 6Mbps/384Kbps cable threw Comcast because I can't get DSL because the tech dud as he was hooking up the phone service said that I was around 21,000 FT from the Qwest telephone switch board.

DSL: 1) The farther away you are from the telephone switch board the slower the speed you will have at your house 2) Not all telephone line in the country in the country are DSL ready

Cable: 1) There is no distance limit so your speed don't slow don't no mater how far you are from the cable office. 2) The more people that use the cable internet in the same area your speed will go down hill 3) The less people that use cable internet in the same area your speeds will go up hill 4) At night your cable speed can go super faster or some times even faster

Satellite 1) For those of you can't get DSL or cable there is satellite witch as far as I know of get up to 1Mbps/700Kbps 2) On a sunny clear day your speeds can be great 3) If the sky is covered with clouds and it raining then your satellite speeds can get very crappy

I'm in the same situation as you. I'm around 20K ft from CO so I can't get DSL either. I've had HSI through Adelphia for over 2 years and it's been a fairly smooth ride but I'm getting to the point where I'd rather have 1.5mbit/384kbit DSL for around $20/month (or cheaper) rather than 4mbit/384kbit for $43/month. SBC/ATT/whoever has been telling me for the past 3 years (I'd originally looked into DSL before subscribing to cable) that DSL would be in my part of town in "the next few months"....total B/S!

Maybe SBC/ATT will roll out something once the Project Lightspeed finally gets going, but even then that's a couple years down the road...when, hopefully, i'll have moved on to a better area....free from SBC/ATT.

Also the tech dud told me that Qwest was going to be installing remote terminals witch would make my distance to the telephone switch board under 18,000 FT but didn't know when Qwest was going to start installing them in my area.

reply to 93254336
telcos should just run all FTTH and solve the distance problem once and for all.
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[65 Arcanist]Filan(High Elf) Zone: Broadband Reports

reply to floydb1982
In reference to #2, the more people who use DSL, the speed slows. Even with less people using DSL, the speed still slows due to a number of things, including distance and line noise. Cable is a fiber/cable hybrid. Most users experience slowdowns with DSL where cable it is more rare. Even a dial-up provider will experience slowdowns if/when the load gets too high. So stating that cable slows due to load and not saying the same for DSL is more untrue than true.

Satellite: The latency is so high that you can't use it for real-time applications like VoIP, gaming and audio and/or video conferencing.

reply to 93254336
Well it may not affect you directly, but the more gains that DSL makes, the more likely it is that cable companies will up the ante (and that affects me), and then the more likely it is that DSL will counter with better offerings. So the more competitive things become, the cheaper it will be for us all . . . at least generally speaking.
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DAMOX Proud to be a member of Team Discovery

reply to floydb1982

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reply to Kompressor

reply to knightmb
I have to correct you here. I have been an engineer for both cable companies and DSL providers. The major difference, in fact the only difference, is the deliverance to the subscriber.


First, you are correct that cable companies still have distance limitations. Cable does not use two copper wires like DSL. Cable uses a coax cable and fiber optics, not twisted pair like the phone company, on the infrastructure. The hybrid network is what allows cable to provide service further out then DSL. Both DSL and cable use RF, and RF signal degrades. The rate of the decay in the signal is different for DSL and cable due to the differences in the cabling used to carry that signal. To boost this distance covered, most cable companies run fiber from the headend to the service area and then do the conversion to RF, thus negating the loss of signal quality due to distance. The trade off is that all cable modems in a given area utilize the same bandwidth in the cable plant. This is where plant design kicks in. The cable company needs to design the plant to support the numbers of subscribers at a given rate of speed. That process might include creating new nodes, or service areas, to limit the number of subscribers in any given grouping of equipment. What you need to understand is that the bandwidth available in the system is greater then the bandwidth available to any one subscriber, but not to all of them added together. This is what leads to the slow down in service when many users are online in an area and is a symptom of a service area that needs to be reengineered by the cable company.


Now, on to DSL. There are several major differences. First, every line in DSL is independent to the customer, as opposed to the shared service that cable uses. So, if you and your neighbor both order DSL his line is a distinctly separate line from his house to the CO then yours. It is also twisted pair all the way from the house to the CO. If there is a SLIC (fiber optic connection in phone wiring) DSL will not work. This inability to utilize fiber in the connection is what limits DSL’s distance. Physical medium is also a factor. The size of the cable used in telephony is smaller then that of the coax cable in cable service. This limits the frequencies that can be carried and/or the distance that you can carry these frequencies before they become to degraded to utilize. That is why the cable company uses the larger coax cable instead of twisted pair cable, more room to move more frequencies. Also, the nature of the service, where every line is independent, makes it more difficult to move the equipment closer to the subscriber. We introduce the term “wire mile” here. Just because you have phone lines to your house, and your neighbor has phone lines to his house, does not mean that those phone lines run the same way down the street. That is correct, over the years the phone company has run wires all over the place. So, you would have to rewire all the connections in an organized manner and essentially rebuild the phone telephone infrastructure.


The shared nature of the cable network is what in the end makes it more able to change and allow for newer technologies. There is less equipment, closer to the customer, and that makes it easier to provide these technologies that we all love. On the flip side, the independent nature of the phone system is what allows for your neighbor’s service to fail and yours to continue working. It is also what makes it more difficult to upgrade and allow for newer uses.

reply to knightmb

reply to floydb1982
All they need to do is install a remote terminal.

1) DSL - speed varies with distance, however, your speed 'should' be consistant, once connected. i.e. sync rate locked at 3008/512.
2) Cable - high burst rates (i.e. maxed at 8/6Mbps/384 kbps), however nodes can get overloaded, especially during peak hours.

Since I perform remote access work, I need consistancy, and decent upload.

reply to BigRooster
I guess I'm behind the times. What in the heck is a tech dud?

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reply to xygor

reply to kahunanull

Yes, both use fiber at different portions of their network. Cable companies get the fiber connection closer to the subscriber then the phone companies do though. The nature of the infrastructure allows for the cable companies to do so since they have less individual equipment impacted due to the architecure of a cable plant. Also, remote terminal is not the correct term in DSL. It is a DSLAM (digital subscriber line access multiplexer) and the DSLAMs are located in the CO of the telco. A CO is designed such that from the CO out to the subscriber is all twisted pair. This creates a huge difference in the distance that can be covered by the DSL signal. Since you cannot just up and rewire a whole city to add a CO, you cannot really reduce the "wire mile" from a CO to a residence without serious re-engineering of a telco line. In the cable world, you just add a new fiber run, and either add a new area of split an existing one. Far less change in cabling is needed to allow for new subscriber areas, or to reduce the size of any given subscriber area since all you need to add/change is the trunk run to the headend, not every single line to every subscribers house.

I understand the point that you were trying to make, and appreciate it. There are many advantages and disadvantages to both means of access, and I tried to point them out. I simply saw a few errors in the information and sought to correct them, while providing some additional information along the way.

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