>         Well probably the biggest pro that goes for DSL is
> that the pipe to your
> home is yours, no sharing bandwidth, no security concerns.

This isn't exactly true. Cable shares on the wire (like a party line); DSL
may or may not share from the Central Office to the ISP.

Bandwidth is a commodity, and it costs money. For the most part, with DSL
you get what you pay for.

ADSL (asymmetric DSL) means your upload speed isn't the same as your
download speed (you usually see something like 640k down, 64k up). This is
just the beginning of the differences - ADSL is usually priced in the
$50/month range, and is positioned as "consumer" or "home" DSL.
ADSL accounts usually do not get a static IP, so running a server or a home
network is more complicated (but doable). HOWEVER, manymany ISP ADSL user
contracts *prohibit* running any kind of web or email server, or using the
account for more than one computer.
Finally, ADSL usually has no service level agreement (SLA), or if it does,
it's very low. I know Bell Atlantic has NO bandwidth guarantee - if you're
connected, but running at 3k instead of 640k, then as far as BA is concerned
they're fulfilling their side of the agreement. (GTE's SLA on ADSL is
something like 48k - less than a dialup modem)

SDSL (symmetric DSL)has both upload and download speeds the same, but the
most important thing is it's usually a more "professionally oriented"
service. Static IP's are the norm, home networks and running servers (within
limits) expressly allowed, etc. There's also usually an SLA (my DSL provider
promises 80% bandwidth at all times)
The trade-off: you get what you pay for: 192k/192k SDSL will run me
$90/month.

The thing with cablemodems and ADSL - during early adoption you'll rarely
see much bandwidth problems. The threat is "as more people sign up", but we
don't know if that'll happen or what the effects will be. It's entirely
possible we won't see problems at all on the throttling side, but there's no
telling.

Philo

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