.:. ames : cable vs. dsl

Cable vs. DSL: the death match

Enough gabbing about myths and factoids. The time has come to pit cable and DSL against each other, service against service, to determine which one has the best chance of ending up in your home. In the next five rounds, we'll judge each choice and ultimately declare a winner.

Round 1: availability
The winner: Cable
We give cable the nod here. Roughly 80 to 85 percent of America's 68 million cable TV subscribers (say, 55 million or so) can get high-speed access, says Instat-MDR analyst Mike Paxton. DSL access is a little spottier, though Instat's Ernie Bergstrom puts the number above 50 million. Odds are, if the cable company is advertising high-speed access in your area, you can get it. But hooking up with DSL can be dicier. Even if you're within the right distance from a phone company's central office, your line might not qualify for various technical reasons.

Round 2: price
The winner: Cable
A random sampling of cable and DSL access plans shows that cable is slightly cheaper on average. Most cable plans cost between $40 and $45 per month, while DSL typically goes for $45 to $50. Installation fees are fairly similar--about $100 for a service visit, while self-install kits range from free to $25 for either service.

Round 3: installation
The winner: Cable
A couple years ago, the Net was rife with horror stories of DSL installations gone awry (granted, you still hear them in some places). In my experiences with DSL, the phone company will only do so much to get your line to the outside of your building or home. To get the service inside requires you find someone else to bring the service inside. It has also been my experience that the service person sent by DSL services claim that they are only phone technicians and can't help very much in the way of support for your new Internet service.

Round 4: security
The winner: tie
All Internet connections leave your PC vulnerable to attack; fast DSL and cable modem hookups simply turn your computer into a more attractive target, thanks to the fact that they're always online. Neither is inherently more secure than the other, but the solution for both is simple. Users of older version of Windows (95, 98, and Me) should turn off printer and file sharing if they don't have home networks. Otherwise they, and all users, should install a software or hardware firewall, hiding any open doors to your computer. We recommend Symantec Norton Personal Firewall.

Round 5: performance
The winner: Cable
So which service is faster, cable modem or DSL? No single answer will suffice for everyone. Cable's theoretical bandwidth limits are higher, and because it's not dependent on distance from a central office, it's more consistent from user to user--unless your next-door neighbor is Blackbeard the MP3 pirate. With DSL, you'll generally get higher speeds the closer you live to the phone company's central office.

The victor: Cable
In our experiences, cable modem access has been faster and more reliable. Cable Internet is driven by state-of-the-art fiber optic cable that carry information at the speed of light. DSL access is usually utilizing the same phone equipment your home or business was wired with during the initial construction many years ago.

Now that you are armed with the facts, Go sign up for Road Runner High-Speed Cable Service today!