Done with AT&T DSL, it sucks, Who has the best service for home Internet?

[kshymkiw83]

TL;DR version: Yes and no... DSL is indeed shared at the upstream module, but the way it's shared is quite different from the way cable (DOCSIS) is shared.

 

More techie version... The difference between DSL and DOCSIS is rather like the difference between UTP-based Ethernet (what we all know and love today with CAT5 twisted pair) and thin-coax based Ethernet (aka 10Base2). With DSL, it's store-and-forward, and if more than one computer wants to talk at the same time, the DSLAM, much like an Ethernet switch, just stores the extra packets until the appropriate line is open, then sends them on their way. With DOCSIS, if one computer is talking, all the others have to shut their mouths, otherwise, the two signals will overlap and create noise which the processors can't interpret. When this collision is detected, each modem waits some random amount of milliseconds, then attempts to transmit again. That's why just a handful of kids downloading torrents on cable can bring the entire neighborhood to a crawl, while DSL users don't even realize the rest of the neighborhood is watching "Avatar HD" at the same time.

 

So why don't we see DOCSIS coming to a crawl more often, and able to offer both higher baseline and "turbo" speeds? Because the tech behind coax cable makes it more efficient at transmitting gobs of data, while twisted pair telephone is, well, almost as old as the telephone itself.

 

I would agree with you until you got to DOCSIS. Being an Engineer who works in a DOCSIS enviornment all day, your are 100% wrong about DOCSIS.

[FST94TSI]

Jd power may disagree but ive had uverse cable and Internet for a couple of years now and aside from the first router box they gave me going bad ive never had a problem with it at all. The only thing I'd like to see improved upon is the capability to record more channels at once than they allow now. It's all personal preference but in central Ohio there's not really anything close. Time Warner is horrible, wows a joke, and sat., well I'd like to have service storm or not.

[kshymkiw83]

Jd power may disagree but ive had uverse cable and Internet for a couple of years now and aside from the first router box they gave me going bad ive never had a problem with it at all. The only thing I'd like to see improved upon is the capability to record more channels at once than they allow now. It's all personal preference but in central Ohio there's not really anything close. Time Warner is horrible, wows a joke, and sat., well I'd like to have service storm or not.

 

So if your watching 4 HD Streams in your house at 1 time, how fast can you download from the net?

 

That's right, you don't have any bandwidth left to get more than 1 Mbps down.

[Nitrousbird]

So if your watching 4 HD Streams in your house at 1 time, how fast can you download from the net?

 

That's right, you don't have any bandwidth left to get more than 1 Mbps down.

And that's only if he is close to a CO - further you get, the worse UVerse gets. It's amazing how many people try out Uverse and switch back a couple weeks later. Hell, they keep laying off employees; I've interviewed a bunch and hired a couple of them.

[mmrmnhrm]

I would agree with you until you got to DOCSIS. Being an Engineer who works in a DOCSIS enviornment all day, your are 100% wrong about DOCSIS.

Things have changed? That was how it was explained in the articles written about it during my college days. Do elaborate, it'd be nice to update my learnings!

[kshymkiw83]

Things have changed? That was how it was explained in the articles written about it during my college days. Do elaborate, it'd be nice to update my learnings!

 

In some essence, yes it is like that and no it isn't.

 

In the old days it used to be a Giant pseudo Token Ring, exactly what you were saying 1 talker at a time.

 

Now we have hundreds of contention slots on a router. Each talker (voice or data) ties up 1 or more contention slots.

 

Although there is still even more to it than that. Especially once you get into QAM Modulation Profiles, etc.... You could easily spend hours talking about DOCSIS.

[kshymkiw83]

And that's only if he is close to a CO - further you get, the worse UVerse gets. It's amazing how many people try out Uverse and switch back a couple weeks later. Hell, they keep laying off employees; I've interviewed a bunch and hired a couple of them.

 

I would agree. My wife works for Sutherland Global doing U-Verse Support from home. I sometimes hear the calls, and most people seem to be generally frustrated with the service. Those who are heavy Internet users, generally don't watch a lot of TV. And those who are heavy TV users don't generally use high bandwidth applications.

 

Once you combine the two though, heavy TV user and heavy Internet/Application users, then U-Verse begins to show why it sucks.

 

In general how I (a TWC Employee) feel about all the services out there:

 

Verizon FiOS - Best Method of delivery - FTTH is amazing. They did RFOG (RF over Glass) though, which puts them somewhat ahead of Cable MSO's, but not really.

 

ATT U-Verse - Best backend. The fact that EVERY aspect of U-Verse is IP, is awesome. It is the future. Had they gotten out of VDSL and twisted pair, and went to pure ethernet and FTTH, nothing could beat it.

 

Cable MSO's - Playing catchup. I don't think most Cable MSO's thought ATT or Verizon would be successful, but they were wrong. I know at TWC with our rollout of Docsis 3.0 we are also rolling our MOCA (whole home DVR) and will soon be rolling out a DOCSIS Set-Top Gateway (think U-Verse, but Cable Company).