Cable Internet Vs DSL

[mmiranda]

Hi

I am currently using DSL service at the momemt at 15Mbps so I decided to try Fido Home Internet at 30Mbps. I was wondering if cable internet will be able to attain the maximum bandwidth since the main trunk cable is usually shared with others in the area, this tends to slow the speeds overall. Anyone feedback on the speed?

**Edited to add labels ** 

[zyx]

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@mmiranda wrote:

Hi

I am currently using DSL service at the momemt at 15Mbps so I decided to try Fido Home Internet at 30Mbps. I was wondering if cable internet will be able to attain the maximum bandwidth since the main trunk cable is usually shared with others in the area, this tends to slow the speeds overall. Anyone feedback on the speed?

**Edited to add labels ** 

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"...this tends to slow the speeds"... I've heard that ever since it was possible to get an Internet connection through cable.

It came from the phone companies, and it's a deliberate lie. It's the equivalent of Ford saying that Honda cars explode without reason regularly. They could not have come up with a more dishonest "argument".

First, I could get a 200Mbps link to my house (Fido Internet isn't available here so it's not Fido), so I'm pretty sure the neighborhood can take more than my 30Mbps.

Second, your transfer speed depends on the slowest link between your computer and the remote server. With both cable and DSL, all traffic goes through the ISP's only link - that's your first bottleneck. So in effect, every single subscriber is using that single connection anyway.

Next, how many of your neighboors are downloading 24/7? When you look up a page, or reply to these forums, there's a burst to get the data, but then the line goes silent as you read/write, until you click a link or the Post button.

The phone companies never talked about how, with DSL, the farther you are from the central, the slower their link is. They just couldn't compete back then, so they made bovine-manure fake "arguments".

Every single time I've tested my Internet connection, I got between 30 and 33Mbps for my 30Mbps connection. I just did a test with a server across the country: 32.13Mbps.

Bottom line: it's a lie, don't worry about it and enjoy your full 30Mbps!

[mmiranda]

Thank you for the response, I will wait and post my feedback on the service

[AdamBeast · Accepted solution]

The quality of a DSL line depends on your distance from the Centra office that you are connected to. 

And in fact, most people cannot never reach the max speed of DSL service, most people will only get about 60% to 80% of announced speed. 

i.e. My previous ISP is a ADSL2+ service for 24Mbps, I live about 1km from the nearest central office. 

And my download speed can reach only 2.2MB/s ( which is 17.6Mbps) max. 

The good thing for dsl is that peak hour or not, I can always reach 2.2MB/s speed. 

Then I switched to cable 30MB/s, and my top download speed can reach to 30Mbps ( 3.75MB/s) all the time. 

In theory, for cable internet, you are sharing the available bandwidth of a single cable line with others in your neighborhood.  The more people using it at the same time, the slower the performance.

But considering Canada's population per area, I don't think this is a real issue. ( unless most of your neighbors are all geeks keeping downloading/uploading all day long) . 

In my experience, cable is more stable, faster and lower latency over dsl. 

[FidoRanya]

Hey mmiranda, 

Thanks for your thread, it's actually a really good question. 

We've had a few customers do some speedtests and they definitely attained the maximum bandwidth. However, I can't tell you if it'll be different for now depending on the traffic. 

 @Community, any insights on this?