CABLE VERSUS DSL – WHICH FREEWAY IS FASTER?

Last week, I moved my family into our new home in Jefferson City. One of the first things that a tech geek like me had to do was decide on which high speed internet service provider would be the best choice in terms of price and bandwidth offered. My choices were Mediacom Cable Internet service and Century Link DSL service.

It was a tough decision, and I wish it were more clear-cut than it was. But after analyzing the pros and cons of both styles of broadband internet services, one company edged out the other.

In my previous house, my only option was a 1.5mb DSL service. It was horribly inadequate and rarely ran above 0.8mb in speed. But at my new home location, the fastest speed of DSL service was available. I could opt for 10mb service at $39 a month with one line, or even go for the new 20mb bonded line option at only $69 per month. Century Link’s main selling point was the fact that their broadband is not shared among a group of people in a neighborhood, as is the case with Mediacom’s cable internet service. The rated speed that is advertised is the speed you will get alone. This was a big plus. The only negative aspect I could see with the DSL option was the fact that 10mb could be approaching the limit of maximum future speed due to the smaller size of the phone lines which carry the signal.

Mediacom was offering a 12mb service bundled with extended cable for $59 per month, and $79 per month after the first year. This was an attractive price. But once again, the Internet is shared across a group of people in the neighborhood. With everyone using the Internet at the same time, speeds could be lowered depending on how much bandwidth was being downloaded. But the plus side of this was the fact that Mediacom’s highest rating was 2mb faster than the DSL package for one phone line, plus the company plans to raise the top speed to 15mb this fall at no additional charge.

This was a tough decision, but what tips the scale to the favor of the winner boils down to the greater upside potential of cable Internet access. Let’s face it… the “big fat wire” with the copper middle has more throughput potential than the thin telephone line. We are much closer to the maximum amount of data we can cram through existing infrastructure (all things being kept equal) for telephone lines than we are for cable wire.

Something else worth mentioning, the bandwidth speed draw down during peak times for a cable modem is not nearly as bad as what the phone company wants you to believe. As you can see from the picture above, my speed during a peak time today (around 7pm) was 8.3mb. At other times, I run at speeds 11 to 12mb. So clearly this is not a major issue.

I am absolutely excited to have my cable Internet access back again, and I will probably stick with it because it meets my needs. What are your main uses of your high speed Internet access, and which type of service do you subscribe to? What are the pros and cons that affected your decision, and how satisfied are you with the customer service you have received? Sound off below!

Carlton Flowers
Techno Geek

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