Cable Sprints, DSL Trudges, Free ISPs Pant

Aarthek writes: "A new report is showing how people are signing on to the internet. Notice that the growth according to this report shows that DSL has had less than 2% growth in the first quarter of 2001. Where Cable is showing a 18% growth. The full report can be found here." This certainly matches my experience with DSL vs. cable, but for various reasons you're probably familiar with, DSL can be a better way to connect -- if it's available in your area, and you have a solvent provider, and you're near enough to a CO, and they'll squeeze you in an installation time, and your house wiring is up to it.

Comments

The only problem with the Free ISP model was...

[jht]

The only problem with the Free ISP model was that all the companies that offered it were based on the fantasies of crack-addled minds. That's the only possible explanation. I mean, just because people are accustomed to Free Stuff On The Internet, it does not mean that the Internet itself can be free. One reason that broadcast TV works as a free access model is that there is no need to build out infrastructure to connect each subscriber (unlike the ISP business). Cable TV, OTOH, charges a premium to access each home, because they need...

Infrastructure!

Just like the free ISP's did. What a coincidence! Something like a TV or radio benefits from the Network Effect (or Metcalfe's Law) because the broadcasting to the first TV costs millions of dollars (for the studios, transmitters, etc.), but it costs $0 per set after that. The more sets, the more money the broadcaster makes.

In the ISP business, though, it costs money to support each subscriber - in technical support, fixed wiring costs, phone/modem server costs (for dial-up networks), wholesale DSL costs (for folks like WinFire), and bandwidth. These costs don't magically get cheaper with size - they continue to grow. If you lose $5 per subscriber-month, then you lose $50,000 per month with 10K subscribers, and assuming (generously) that you can reduce your expenses by $3 per subsciber-month at 100,000 subscribers, you're still losing $200,000 per month at that level. It doesn't make sense now, and it didn't make sense then, either.

My local paper (the Boston Globe) has a consumer column that runs on Sundays. A few weeks ago it spotlighted the demise of free ISP's, and featured quotes from several customers of defunct free ISP's who "felt screwed". I tell you, I never laughed so hard reading anything other than comics in a newspaper.

After I recovered my breath, I then wrote a reasoned response to the consumer advocate and explained Economics 101 (which, unfortunately, I think most self-styled consumer advocates either skipped or flunked). Essentially, you can't sell a dollar for 90 cents and make it up in volume. Not surprisingly, I did not hear back directly from him, though he did cite my letter briefly in a follow-up column a few weeks later.

- -Josh Turiel

Cable's a better fit for the problem when surfing.

[landley]

For "surfing" access, cable's a better technical solution. People who think shared bandwidth is somehow not a workable solution for network access have apparently never used ethernet. Dedicated bandwidth is wasted bandwidth if you aren't running a server. Client access is bursty. (Even if you're watching streaming video, you're probably not doing so more than 1% of the time.) In the real world, 90% of the time you're borrowing other people's bandwidth to get way than you would have otherwise.

In my experience, the real bottleneck bandwidth-wise is almost never the last hop in a cable modem. (The cable company's own connection to the internet is often the limiting factor, but if they have two uplinks some sites may be slow while others aren't). If not, the limit's how busy the server you're talking to is, or some other bottleneck in an intermediate hop. Even at peak activity I've never seen a download from an otherwise fast site drop below about 140 kilobytes (not bits, bytes) per second. Average is 250-350, and theoretical peak (never seen it) is 500. I've never seen kernel.org drop below 200k/sec.

Now trying to use a cable modem as a server is ludicrous; upstream bandwidth is only about 20k/second. I uploaded 1.6 gigs to work once, it took a day and change. DSL is a MUCH better solution for servers, in theory anyway. (My own experience with it involves a lot of 15 second signal dropouts which aren't acceptable in a real server. But for a hobbyist starting out, who can't afford anything like server side hosting and needs "surfing" access anyway...)

Determining whether big evil cable corporations are worse than big evil phone companies is an open question, of course. :)

Rob

Re:DSL v. Cable comparo

[swb]

Some reasons why DSL is better than cable: competition between vendors

You understate the value of this, IMHO. The competition between vendors means that there's product differentiation -- ISPs have to do something to make themselves stand out, and one thing mine does is allow me to do whatever I want with my connection -- run servers, connect my home LAN, and so on.

Every SA I've ever seen from a cable company comes down to the fact that they want you downloading HTTP content and anything that remotely resembles anything other than the computer equivilent of watching TV is expressly forbidden.

I also think the idea that cable is a better basic infrastructure is flawed. One reason the cable companies are so paranoid about services is that their infrastructure limitations often limit the amount of bandwidth they can apply to specific geographic regions; you share bandwidth up to whatever point they've determined constitutes a LAN. My understanding is that in most "phase I" internet setups this is a pretty large area, and heavy usage can pretty dramatically impact performance.

DSL's private bandwidth is some advantage; I'm not on the same broadcast domain as the other people in my neighborhood! I don't get a bunch of BS traffic I don't need.

The big question for DSL. . .

[Salgak1]

. . .is will it survive at all ??

It's an interesting paradox: people want it, but all too many can't get it, especially with the implosion of DSL providers. Those of us still up and running on Covad's network get worried, seeing stockholder/bondholder efforts to preserve THEIR equity, CO de-activations, and general nervousness about the service in general.

Yet cable, with its' shared bandwidth, is growing like crazy. As a former @Home user, I hated having bandwidth drop to modem speeds in the evening. But if it's all you can get, what other choice is there ?? (And no, the new StarBand service does NOT support Linux, nor do they claim to ever intend to support "minor operating systems". . . I asked, and was shocked....)

Re:The big question for DSL. . .

[baptiste]

DSL will survive. Perhaps not as a residential solution but you can be sure it will as a commercial access solution. With speeds approaching 4MBit/s on the horizon, symetric high speed DSL makes sense for companies with a couple T1s. And there are lots of those and usually they are close to a CO.

Cable had the advantage that it's network was in betetr shape to handle broad deployment. Telcos are notorious for screwing up new technology deployment (can we say ISDN?) They're trying to screw up DSL too, but I think they'll pull it out.

As always YMMV, but my SDSL line has been like a rock. I run around 40 domains over it with probably 3 or 4 moderate traffic websites (I'm with a Mom & Pop and they're cool with it) and couldn't be happier. It rarely goes down and even then it might be for a minute or two.

Compared to my freinds with Cabel Modems, well, I'll take DSL anyday. Sure they can get blazing download speends IF their neighbors aren't surfing and IF the phase of hte moon is right :) But it depends on the vendor. I've had friends drop Cable for DSL like crazy because of stability and bandwidth issues, but in other areas, its just the opposite.

I think teh telcos are trying to figure out how to use DSL to make money without driving all their customers to cable modems. There have been bumps along the way, but they're learning.

--

DSL v. Cable comparo

[mjh]

This certainly matches my experience with DSL vs. cable, but for various reasons you're probably familiar with, DSL can be a better way to connect

Some reasons why DSL is better than cable:

• competition between vendors

Some reasons why Cable is better than DSL:

• faster
• better basic infrastructure. Whatever you say, twisted pair can not compare with shielded coaxial cable as far as signal quality. And in most cases, the coaxial cable is much shorter than the average twisted pair. After that the service runs on fiber.
• no distance limitations. If you're connected to the cable company and the service is deployed, then you get the service. None of this well my next door neighbor got the service, but I'm too far out to qualify.

Some false reasons whey DSL is better than cable:

• DSL provides guaranteed bandwidth. While, technically this is true, it's really misleading. DSL's guaranteed bandwidth is only to the CO or the exchange. After that, all the bandwidth is shared.
• DSL's private bandwidth provides better security. This is also misleading. Remember, you're connecting to the Internet. Your next door neighbor can still scan and attack your machine. On top of that, most cable systems provide encryption between the cable modem and the cable router at the provider.

For a more eloquant summary of the differences see: Simson Garfinkle's excellent review. It's a bit dated (Sept 1999) but it's still does a good job of cutting through much of the rhetoric.

Re:Bagh humbug

[hderycke]

Cardboard box? You spoiled-rotten johnny-come-lately! In my days, we didn't have any cardboard boxes, or even punch cards. If we wanted any bytes transported, we had to carry them over ourselves, bit by bit, through the snow and ice, uphill both ways. All we had was the bare ones and zeroes, and sometimes, when the money was tight, we didn't even have ones! But we were happy for the zeroes we had, and for any ones we could get. Why was that? Because we had learned to appreciate the value of zero through the suffering we had to go through.

Young upstart ingrates. You've no idea how good you've got it.

Some DSL competition still exists

[jeffsenter]

Some DSL competition still exists.
Check ispmenu for comparison of DSL services still available at any particular address. [/plug] It also compares dialups.

Great ADSL experience

[rtos]

I know it is almost tendy to recount your "I had to fight for 2 YEARS to get DSL" story... blah blah blah. Yes, it can be hard to get connected, but that isn't always the case.

I signed up with Verizon DSL (768 down/128 up) in October 2001. In about 25 days I had a working connection, and to date I would estimate the downtime as virtually zero (maybe an hour or two in 6 months). My connection speeds are usually in the 700 - 800 kbps range during the day, going up as high as 870 kbps during off-peak hours. Upload speeds are consistently in the 130 kbps range. Packet loss is zero. Latency is decent enough that I can play (and serve) UT games without problems. I couldn't be happier.

But you must consider that my apartment is on one side of the block, and on the other side is the CO. Distance means a lot with DSL, and (if the houses weren't there) an athetically inclined person could throw a baseball from my window and hit the CO.

Also, I am using a local ISP with great bandwidth. I pay a little bit more than if I had gone with Verizon as my ISP, but I welcome the chance to support the few remaining independent ISPs.

So that is my experience (a great one!). When people are knocking DSL, remember that not everyone has had a bad time with it.

Timothy nailed it-DSL is nice when it's real

[firewort]

DSL in many areas is a myth- an unsubstantiated rumour.

My co-op here was trying to get DSL- he signed up with Verizon, had them schedule the appt., asked at the time of the appt. to be sure they'd be able to install it- they came out, took one look-see and said that they couldn't install DSL there.

He signed up for cable. The best part is, after scheduling the appt., after being lied to about the availability, Verizon continues to bill him!

DSL would be a great, fast method of connecting, if more than 2% of the people who want fast access could use it. I'm well aware that cable's performance degrades as more users clog the pipes, but for now it's good.

I'm betting that the next big advance will occur right before cable gets so bogged down that I can't stand it any longer.

A host is a host from coast to coast, but no one uses a host that's close

Bagh humbug

[angry old man]

Bagh, Every respectable internet user connects via modem. Now-a-days all you lazy kids think that you need fancy schmancy cable-modem or some other nonsense just to browse all these large graphical websites. If internet connections need to be so fast, then why are new standards such as the passenger pigeon protocol still being developed? Once I shipped a box of cards, punched with VAX, clear accross the country overnight. That was as much bandwidth as anybody might ever need. Anything more is just for lazy disrespecting kids.

If it wasn't for all this bloat everywhere on the net, then we could all use a respectable browser such as Lynx or gopher.

Re:I just want cheap, fast, and static

[dachshund]

Cable is also available here, but ... you can't get a static IP.

Well, you're among the lucky few ADSL subscribers to rate that privilege. I had a line from a (non-Verizon) ISP that included a static IP, then they went out of business. Now you have a choice of Verizon (PPP over Ethernet!!) or several ISPs with straight DHCP. There may be some choice out there somewhere, but it's hard to find.

And with a 128k upstream, having a static IP isn't all it's cracked up to be...