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All of the web pages you view, along with all of your e-mail, arrives
at your computer via your telephone line. The speed that the information
arrives at depends on several things, but one of them is the capacity
of the telephone lines themselves.
Imagine a pipeline carrying water - the bigger the pipe, the more
water can be carried through it, and the faster you could fill up
a bucket at the delivery end.
Most people can download information to their computers at a relatively
slow 56 kilobits per second. At this speed large e-mails (especially
with pictures and other attachments) take a long time to download,
and some web pages can take a while to load fully. Fortunately, technology
has come to the rescue and telephone lines up to ten times faster
than normal are now available.
To enable these faster speeds BT has to make an adjustment to the
telephone exchange - in our case, the one in Sulgrave, and this happened
on 4th August 2004.
Danny's Quick Guide to Purchasing Broadband
Broadband services range from £15 to £50 per month but
before you order broadband there are several things you need to consider:
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Who will you order it
from?
You order broadband from an Internet Service Provider (ISP),
the same companies that provide your dial-up Internet access.
Most ISPs offer a variety of packages and not all are created
equal so make sure you read the small print. If you use an e-mail
address supplied by your current ISP (for example: yourname@btinternet.com)
then you can probably keep the same address if you choose broadband
from the same supplier. If you go somewhere else for broadband
you'll only be able to keep the e-mail address if you continue
to pay for your old dial-up account, which you are unlikely
to want to do. |
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What speed do you want?
Standard dial-up access is at 56 kilobits per second (Kbps),
but "normal" broadband provides access at 512 Kbps.
You must check what speed is offered in the package you order
because the word "broadband" is a generic description
and some ISPs offer "budget" broadband packages at
speeds as low as 150 Kbps.
If budget is not your first consideration then go for super-fast
broadband at 1 Megabits per second (1 Mbps = 1,000 Kbps) or
even 2 Mbps. These higher speeds depend on having a very good
phoneline so not all properties will be able to benefit. Your
telephone line can be tested to see what the maximum speed is
that it will support. |
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Beware "Conditions"
Broadband is an "always on" connection, which means
your computer is connected to the Internet as soon as you switch
it on, and remains connected until you switch your computer
off. It seems therefore that broadband services should offer
unlimited access to the Internet, but this is not always true
and many ISPs impose conditions on their packages to prevent
misuse. The most common condition is to impose a limit on the
amount of data you can download in any one month and this will
vary from supplier to supplier. For example BT Broadband Basic
offers a miserly 1 Gigabyte (1 Gigabyte = 1,000 Megabytes) of
data transfer per month - this could get used up quite quickly
if the user was sending or receiving lots of photos or videos
for example.
Although conditions can seem restrictive they are there for
a reason. ISPs that offer completely unlimited services could
be open to their services being hogged by unscrupulous users
who are moving extremely large amounts of data via the Internet.
The ISPs terms and conditions may prevent this from happening,
but then it's not truly "unlimited" is it!? |
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What is
the Contention Ratio?
The Contention Ratio is the number of people that "share"
the same access channel as you. Imagine if you had 3 showers
at home. If only one is being used at a time the water comes
out at high pressure and is piping hot. If someone else in the
house turns on their shower the water pressure may drop and
the water may get cooler. If the third person turns on their
shower the first person is liable to get an unpleasant and icy
cold burst of water as the water boiler struggles to keep up
with demand. This is Contention Ratio. Most ISPs offer contention
ratios of around 50:1 for home users and 20:1 for business users.
Obviously the lower the number the more likely you are to obtain
maximum speeds on your Internet connection.
Clearly the Contention Ratio is an important part of the overall
package, yet you will probably have to dig deep in to the small
print to find out what your ISP is offering. |
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All the extras
As though it wasn't already complicated enough, and hard enough
to compare the myriad broadband packages on offer you must next
consider all the little "extras". For example, is
your ISP offering free installation and a free modem (the gismo
that connects your computer to the phone line), or does it charge
for every conceivable little add-on? An attractive monthly access
price can soon become expensive with high up front costs.
Some ISPs offer unlimited e-mails with you account, or even
unlimited web space to which you could publish your very own
web site! Other ISPs charge extra if you want anymore than 3
e-mail addresses (which any family probably would). |
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Weigh up
all your options
It's always a good idea to look at all the options available
to you. For background information just type the word "broadband"
in to Google.
For a list of broadband providers and links to their web sites
I've found this page at UKOffer.com.
For a complete run down on all things broadband there is a wealth
of information at ADSLGuide.com. |
Broadband came to Helmdon because of a concerted and coordinated effort
by campaign organisers in Helmdon, Sulgrave, Culworth, Moreton Pinkney
and Weston to reach the BT trigger level of 250 registrations. This
was achieved on 5th March 2004 and BT carried out the work to upgrade
the exchange for broadband on 4th August 2004. If you would like to
learn more about how this was achieved please contact Helmdon's broadband
co-ordinator, Jane Keys at webmaster@helmdon.com. |
