[ale] recommended personal DSL provider for Alpharetta ?

[Jim Popovitch]

On Sun, 2006-09-24 at 12:42 -0400, James P. Kinney III wrote:
> Hi Courtney,
> 
> DSL: your bandwidth is YOUR bandwidth. System doesn't slow down when the
> kids get home from school because they are on the cable modem shared
> bandwidth with you. 

That has to be one of the longest running, and most outrageous, _myths_
propagated by the DSL industry.  The fact is that all of your packets
cross paths at some point with your neighbor's packets.  Whether they do
it in your neighborhood Cable plant or at your DSL provider's DSLAM, the
packets will share a common path with others at some point.  On DSL
lines you and your neighbors have direct twisted-pair paths to the DSL
providers DSLAM.... BUT, you share with your neighbors the same
T-1/DS3/GigE from the DSLAM to the rest of the Internet.

The truth is that in a cable RF plant any impact to a customer is from
direct neighbors (those with in proximity to your residence), that is
those who are all downstream from the same RF amplifier.  With DSL your
service could be impacted by someone on the other side of town who is
patched into the same DSLAM as you are.  An isolated RF problem, on a
small segment of a cable plant, is much easier to diagnosis than cross
town inter-connects.  IMHO. 

-Jim P.