Do 500KB Rates Really Count As Broadband and Other Questions

[crashboy]

Hello everyone, I have some questions about my cable modem service. I am new to cable, last two months, but concerned that I am getting ripped off. I have an old Pentium Pro 200Mhz machine and decided it would be good for an internet machine. So my cable company recently started carring high speed internet access. However, the rates they advertise are much slower than some of the rates I see here. Anyway here are my questions, some are common so please bear with me. I am reading all I can about this science.

1. Cable company says maximum rate should be 500KB. I see posts here for cable modems near 7MB. I get High/Low, 350KB/50KB. My cable company's service provider is ispchannel.com. Shouldn't the rate be much higher?

2. I did not have an ethernet card or modem, so the company supplied on --Free. They do permit you to have your own. Are the ones they supplied cheap? Would I benefit from buying a good modem and card from a recognized industry leader? -- Modem RCA, DCM225, Ethernet Card, Kingston KNE30.

3. They used RG6 cable from the street to my connection. Is this the best cable type?

4. There are no filters on the cable side of the splitter to filter TV noise/signals. Would this help improve my signal and speed?

5. Is there any software test that can determine how many users are on my node?

Thanks to anyone and all that can help educate me on some of the questions above.

[quickfoot]

Are you referring to kilobits or kilobytes?

1 kilobyte = 8 kilobits.

What Internet explorer reports to you is kilobytes.

For example most @home connections in my area are capped at 1.5 megabits per second which is 187 kilobytes.

[Kip Patterson]

Please don't shoot the messenger, but:

ISPChannel is essentially kaput. Don't expect service beyond the first of January. You may wish to call your cable company and see who, if anyone, they are negotiating with to take over the role of ISP.

Regrettably, your other questions are moot at this point.

See: http://www.softnet.com/company/press/release/00_12_11.0

Sorry,

[crashboy]

quickfoot, I thought I meant Kilobits, but per your cap number I guess I need to check. It doesn't sound reasonable that my cable carrier would deliver 350 Kilobytes.

Originally posted by quickfoot:
Are you referring to kilobits or kilobytes?

1 kilobyte = 8 kilobits.

What Internet explorer reports to you is kilobytes.

For example most @home connections in my area are capped at 1.5 megabits per second which is 187 kilobytes.

[Snowman]

Unfortunately, ISPChannel completely sucks, hence thats why they are going out of business. Yes, it is better than dialup, but a piss-poor excuse for a "broadband" provider.

my 2 cents...

[quickfoot]

I get 400 kilobytes per second down on my @home cable connection.

I sustained this speed over multiple 650 megabyte transfers as well so it isn't just initial download speed.

------------------
Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer

FreeBSD - The Power To Serve

[crashboy]

Brent, Hellraiser, others, OK, with the bit/byte thing outta way, here is what I have confirmed. Below is a ISPChannel's cable speed description.

ISP Channel service provides access speeds of up to 500Kbps over cable with a cable modem. The difference between 56Kbps modem and 500Kbps cable modem is bandwidth. Think of a 56K modem as a 4-lane freeway at rush hour. Its bandwidth is 4-lanes. When it's full, speed is limited to the flow of traffic. Now think of a cable modem as that 4-lane freeway expanded to 40 lanes. Imagine how much faster traffic would flow!

What I have deduced from this based on all the comments is this

1. It barely qualifies for broadband
2. I should not expect much more consider the source
3. Wiring looks good, Modem is ok, ethernet card may/maynot help.
4. Feel like the guy with the ugly girl at the dance, she ain't much, but I ain't alone.

How can I make if better ?

[Lex Luthor]

Why would you say this barely qualifies as broadband? Geeze, verizon and other DSL providers are signing people up left and right at 640/90 which is really about 540/75 after overhead. That's not much more and they charge $40 and up for that.

Of course, I somewhat agree with you. When you have a 400KBytes + cable connection, 500kbits does barely seem like broadband.

So how does verizon actually get people to sign up for their service in areas with good cable providers then???? I've spoken to lots of ppl and seen lots of posts from people that think 500kbs from Verizon is the same as 500KBs from Cable and don't realize they are getting 1/8th the speed and that's how they get a lot of customers.

Lex

[chumpy]

Be happy. I've got Pac Bell DSL and I'm lucky to maintain a consistent 40KB/second ever. It flucuates between 30 and 40 most the time. I can only dream of getting those 100 or 150 or higher downloads that people on here talk about. At least it's better than 4 or 5 on my 56k.

------------------
Ugh!!!

[exesion]

Crashboy I feel related to you in a way. With my adelphia connection I get about 100kbytes (yes, bytes) downstream during un-peak hours. Unfortunately, this speed during unpeak hours drops to my peak hour rates of somewhere around 11 kbytes a second. So, at 4am downloading a 10meg file I'll go from 100kbytes to the 15 area within 20 seconds. So, you're better off than me; enjoy it. By the way if anyone knows how to get better speeds with adelphia (all tweaks work for an hour it seems then back to crap speed) please email me or post back. I know adelphia sucks, I don't need to hear that 'cause they're the only game in town. Thanks.

------------------
Blow me away.

[Brent]

To answer your questions any though so that you may learn:

1. When people post numbers like 7mbps or 3mbps or 5mbps they are using Mega-Bits per second. Take the Mega-bits per second number and divide by 8 go get Killo-Bytes per second. For example 7mbps would be 875KB/sec (killo-bytes) per second. 5mbps would be 625KB/sec and 3mbps would be 375KB/sec. If your provider offered 500kbps service that would be 65KB/sec MAX that you would get, unless they were refering to Killo-Bytes. It's the whole mess of killo-bits and killo-bytes and mega-bits, it's really easy though, just remember take the Bits Number and Divide by 8 go get the Bytes number, and take the Bytes number and multiply by 8 to get the bits number.

2. Possibly a better NIC and Modem could yeild better speeds, but since your ISP is outta the biz, well um.....

3. RG6 is the Best

4. The less spliters and filters you have the better, signal won't effect speed, it will effect conectivity

5. Not really

And one last thing, have you tried any Registry Speed Patches?



------------------
Striking Fear in the Heart of Newbies Because I am BRENT JUSTICE: Man of Action Defender of Good and Destroyer of Evil

My site www.coremeltdown.com

[hellraiser]

Its not 500KB its 500kilobits which is about 62KB. Which is pretty slow.

[glc1]

Originally posted by hellraiser:
Its not 500KB its 500kilobits which is about 62KB. Which is pretty slow.

Yes, it's slow compared to others who have no cap/higher caps, however, it's still nearly 9.5x faster than 56k, and nothing, short of going w/another ISP/technology, can be done about the cap.