What broadband connection is better? Well, that's a tough question to answer considering how frequently they change nowadays. Most broadband type connections are in a state of flux. T1, T2, and T3 connections are the best route to go. However for a T1 connection, most of us cannot fork out $500-$1000 a month. T2 and T3 connections are even more costly. That leaves a choice between 3 other broadband connections: Cable, DSL, and ADSL/SDSL. ADSL/SDSL is far from being a preferred choice for gaming, but probiably the best chioce for video conferencing. It uses your telephone lines to connect you to the interent without tieing up your phone line like dail-up does. Although it seems like a great service by offering just as much upload as download especially at high numbers. To play online pretty much lag free you need and up/download of 160 KB. Once you know you are getting that much in speed, the greatest factor in playing lag free is your PING. ADSL/SDSL have horrid PING times that do not even begin to jump until data is being transferred. This can really ruin the gaming experince for all those connected with you. DSL is a great way to go. It uses a sattilitte to connect you to the internet. It's mostly a preferred choice among most poeple. You don't have to worry about sharing your connection speed, but it can go down during bad weather. However, when it comes to PING's DSL can at times, have a lower PING than any of the 3 broadband services. However, it is not very stable. It will still jump and down a little but not bad enough to cause problems like the ADSL/SDSL does. Cable is my choice of connection for gaming, but only for gaming. It tends to have a more stable PING which is one of the greatest factor when playing online, if not the greatest factor. With cable, you don't have to worry about alot of rising problems that can accur during gameplay. Let's compare the 3... Bandwidth, Both DSL and Cable have bottleneck datastream. So with DSL most providers offer advertised speeds of 1.5 MB(1500KB) download and 768 KB upload. With the bottleneck datastream, you will lose about 5-15% of advertised download speed and lose about 25-75% of your upload speed. With Cable, it's the opposite. You'll lose about 25-75% of your advertised download speed, while only losing 5-15% of your upload speed. Which is more needed in speeds, download or upload?With ADSL/SDSL you'll only lose about 1-5% of your upload/download speeds. PING's, ADSL/SDSL have very, very unstable PING's. In fact, some are disconnected from the interent. Like cable, the more folks that are using that service in your area, the more speed you lose. With cable you lose bandwidth, with ADSL/SDSL you recieve a greater PING. Cable although, does have the most stable PING. While DSL may be have little lower PING at times, it does increase a little higher at other times, fluxuwaiting. Price, Prices vary greatly, most overall cable tends to have the lower price between the 3, but only by about $10. Most DSL and ADSL/SDSL prices range around $50 a month, when cable price ranges around $40-$50 a month. Equipment, All 3 require modems, so we know that. DSL requires a sattilitte, which in most cases, requires you to sign a contract for sattilitte channel service. Unless you have a few hundred just to fork out on a sattilitte dish. In most cases, you are stuck with having to pay a sattilitte channel service to have DSL broadband, simply because of the contract need to obtain the sattilitte without having to pay a few extra hundred dollars for one. ADSL/SDSL requires no extra equipment, but half the time it calls for rewiring your phone lines. In most cases it doesn't cost extra, but can be inconcevient. You do have to have a phone service to have ADSL/SDSL broadband. Cable requires no addiational equipment, except for an extra cable line being ran into your house. In most cases this does not cost extra, and isn't much of an hassle. You do not have to subscribe to cable channel service in order to have cable broadband. In thoery, DSL and ADSL/SDSL look best on paper, but in my opinion cable out preforms. I recommend cable for gaming... PING is the time it takes for the information to travel from one distination to another. For example: from PC to PC. This doesn't measure the time it takes to travel from PC to server, that would be up/download speed. PING in my opinon is the greatest factor in having lag free gaming. PING is measured in miliseconds, the lower the better. Normally, anything over 60 ms will causes a little lag, but hardly noticiable. PING's over 90 ms, will differently begin to be noticiable. PING's over 120 will develope problems for your connection. High PING's does not only slow your speed down to a crawl, but slows it down for everyone esle that may be connected to you. High PING's occur when data is lossed (Packet loss) or arrives out of order. Most of the time this is caused by interent congestion, but PING is mostly effected by distance. The PING between you and someone esle in your state should be remarkiably low. While your PING between you and someone on the other side of the country should be high enough to causes connection problems. |
