DSL High Speed Internet

Written by Tom FRIEDMAN

DSL or Digital Subscriber Line is one of the commonly used types of Internet connections. DSL is mainly used for home purposes rather than for companies. DSL has been around since 1998, but since then it has improved a lot. Last great upgrade was done by a Korean company that enabled a bandwidth of 50mb/s, but typical DSL connection for home use goes from 1mb/s up to 6mb/s. Depending on the provider you choose you may get more, but there is always a difference in downstream and upstream speed between providers. The most common downside to DSL connection is the upstream which is very limited in most cases.

DSL makes use of a phone line but unlike dial-up the phone line can be used at the same time to make and receive calls. A splitter is used to split the phone signal and DSL modem signal. This way you can have the phone free and you will be connected to the Internet all the time. You don’t have to worry if your phone company offers DSL or not since most phone companies do offer DSL, but if yours doesn’t, you can always go to a private company offering DSL that will connect you. One of the needed things to be able to connect to Internet using DSL is the proximity to the phone central. Depending on the distance between you and the providers’ location the speed of your Internet might vary. The usual distance from the company and the modem, which is in your home, is from 3 to 5 miles. Everything beyond that can only be connected to DSL if the phone company has upgraded the copper wires with optical fiber cable.

Types of DSL

There are several types of DSL; most of them use the same technology, the basic difference between most of them is that some use a splitter and some don’t. Some companies split the signal in their central which means that a modem is not needed. This is often referred to as “a splitterless DSL connection”.

ADSL

ADSL is the most commonly used type of DSL; this is the type of connection that over 80% of the phone companies provide. ADSL stands for asymmetric DSL. ADSL has been developed for the home based user’s convenience. Since most home based users are browsing the net and download frequently they don’t have a big need for uploading which is why ADSL is perfect for them. It was specifically designed to upgrade the downstream speed at the cost of the upstream speed. The common ratio would be 10:1 when you compare the two speeds. So if you have a 1mb/s downstream, you will most likely have a 128kb/s upstream. The biggest advantage of ADSL is that you don’t share the bandwidth in your area which is the case with a cable or wireless connection.

CDSL

CDSL or Consumer DSL is another form of ADSL. This form is rarely used; it has only 1mb/s downstream. This is a splitterless DSL connection which may be the only advantage.

RADSL

RADSL or rate adaptive DSL is what you might call a smart connection system. The system can determine the speed of signals that can be transmitted over the line and according to that it adjusts its speed. In this case the downstream is twice as fast as the upstream. If the download speed is 2mb/s, upload speed is 1mb/s.

VDSL

VDSL or Very High Data Rate DSL is still something that’s being developed. It’s rarely used and when used it’s used only by companies for business. The speed can go over 50mbps but the downside is that it can only be used in a proximity of circa 350 meter of a phone central.
These would all be asymmetric types of DSL. We said earlier that asymmetric allows for faster downstream and slower upstream. The alternative is symmetric DSL. Symmetric DSL allows for equal downstream and upstream and is also commonly used by companies or professional designers and the like.

HDSL

HDSL or High Rate DSL is one of the older types of DSL. It has the same bandwidth and speed for both downloading and uploading. The fastest speeds you can get with HDSL are around 2mbps.

SDSL

SDSL or Symmetric DSL is very similar to HDSL. The only difference is that it’s rate adaptive. It’s also similar to RADSL, except for the fact that it is symmetric. The maximum speed is also around 2mbps.

IDSL

IDSL or ISDN DSL is actually just slightly faster than IDSN but besides that there are no differences.
These are the basic types of DSL Internet connections. Depending on your needs and your budget you should try to figure out what will work best for you. What is DSL and what are the common types of DSL with the description of most used types.

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