How to shop for an Internet connection

Question: Should I get a 56K modem, a cable modem or higher speed service? –B.B.

Answer: The wave of the future is certainly high-speed services such as a digital subscriber line (DSL) or a cable modem connection, but there still is a case to be made for modem dial-up services. It all depends on your budget and your internet usage. Modem connections are still the economical way to go.
All-you-can-eat packages, where you can connect as long as you like, are still in the $20 to $25 range in Canada and don’t seem to be budging.

If you anticipate less usage, you can get limited usage packages. If you’re really on a tight budget, less expensive plans and free dial-up accounts are available, although you’ll be subject to limited customer service, occasional busy signals, or in-your-face advertising.

If you use dial-up, obviously you’ll also need a telephone line to connect to the internet. While you are on that line, callers will get a busy signal, or will be bumped to voice mail if you have it installed on the line. You could opt for a second phone line because you don’t want to miss those calls — or hassle with call-waiting software that tells you when you have incoming calls while you’re on line — but you have to factor in the cost of that second phone line and/or call-waiting notification service.

That may eat into, or even erase, the money you’d save by opting for a dial-up connection. The fastest modems on the market are touted as having connection speeds of up to 56 kilobits per second. Thanks to regulation, modem makers are forced to build in a limitation that put a cap on the speed of their connections.

If line conditions are optimal between the dial-up modem and the internet service provider, that means a one-megabyte file would download in about 2.5 minutes. Typical connection speeds with a 56K modem are about 40 Kbps to 45 Kbps. Upload speed is limited to 33.6 Kbps. Cable modems and DSL modems offer substantially faster connection speeds. Depending on the provider, connection speeds of one to two megabits per second (Mbps) are possible, though typical conditions provide 200 to 700 kilobits per second connections. Under these conditions, with a cable or DSL modem, a one-megabyte file will download in seconds. Upload speeds are limited to a maximum of one megabit per second, but typically are lower than download speeds.

DSL is actually a category of a digital internet connection that includes Symmetric Digital Subscriber Line (SDSL) and Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) and other variants. ADSL is the most common DSL technology in Canada.

The connection capacity of these technologies is up to 32 Mbps when data is downloaded and up to 1 Mbps of upload bandwidth. Initial services offered in North America offer about 1 Mbps of bandwidth, with faster connection speeds promised as the technology becomes more widespread. DSL works over conventional
phone lines and is a direct digital connection from you to the Internet service provider, normally the phone company. It doesn’t interrupt regular voice calls.

Cable modem technology offers similar speeds, though bandwidth is shared in a neighborhood. Data comes in through a cable TV connection off a loop that runs through a neighborhood. The more of your neighbors on that loop, the less bandwidth available to you. Both technologies are “always on”. There’s no dial-up connection necessary and companies that offer this service provide it on a flat rate. In Canada, cable modem service or DSL costs the consumer about $45 Canadian. The cost is about $75 Canadian per month for business.

This “always on” connection poses an increased problem with data security. When a computer is connected to the Internet with one of these technologies, it can be seen by outsiders and needs to be protected by a firewall, a hardware or software solution that filters traffic between the computer and the Internet.