Since @Home went down and back up in many parts of the country , many folks are considering changing to DSL or satellite. While I have not had too many problems with my DSL, i did learn a thing or two when alking to some of the DSL provider techs. One is that the Static IP accounts have less problems, so if it is available to you, try to get one of those rather than one with a dynamic IP. Not sure why that is, but thats what I was told.

Also, for those who want to check their line speeds, http://www.dslreports.com is a good site to check out for info and tools to check speed.

Just blabbing, but I figure this may help someone. For now, my PabBell DSL is working fine at 650download and 110 upload.

 

I'm surprised that Pacbell DSL in San Jose is working well for you. My business partner has them, and he has had nothing but problems. Their mail server SUCKS. It takes him 30 minutes to send me anything by e-mail, and conversely, it takes him 30 minutes to get anything I send him. Maybe the area of San Jose that he lives in just has bad lines or something.

By the way, they usually try to charge you more for the static IP addresses. That's probably why it's better, since they make more money off of you

 

im on roadrunner
and mines been screwy the past few day
heres my speed
440 down/355 up

usually its 1100+down/200+up

i just retested and now 1310down/354up

 

I thought a static IP address was a bad thing for being hacked? The computer puts out the same address of who and where it is everytime you are on-line. I thought the dynamic was better because everytie you logon you are using a different address. Can someone correct me? The good/bad of static vs. dynamic? thanks

 

rough list
static
advantages
you can run servers and not worry about having to send out your new ip address every time it changes
disadvantages
hackers love them

dynamic
advantages
less worrying about hackers

disadvantages
if you run server you have to worry about sending out ips or knowing your ip if you remote access your computer

 

Att Broadband internet has replaced @home here in Texas. The change over took about two days and we got two days credit for every one day of down time. Actually, it was a pretty smooth transition, especially since I was out of town at the time.

 

Actually either is ok if you put a firewall of some sort in between your machine and the outside connection. Linksys makes a router for just such a thing. One of the things you can set is whether it will answer pings or not. If you set this so it doesn't answer pings most hackers won't even notice your machine.

That's not to say your machine can't be found. But most hackers simply just try to ping addresses in an automated fashion as a first step to to find machine's to hack. If your machine never answer the ping, it doesn't show up in their list. They then have to go through a little more to find it.

Linksys routers also let you share a connection with several machines. The router can be setup in about five minutes. They also work with static or dynamic IP addresses.

 

oh yeah, i forgot about the hacker issue... I have the Linksys router and firewall so that has helped...so far.

My Static IP was assign long ago as I have had DSL for many years now. I found out today that SBC/Pac Bell typically doesn't issue Static IP's to individual users now. At least not for basic DSL, only for "enhanced" service.

[QUOTE]posted by MarkS2K
I'm surprised that Pacbell DSL in San Jose is working well for you. My business partner has them, and he has had nothing but problems. Their mail server SUCKS. It takes him 30 minutes to send me anything by e-mail, and conversely, it takes him 30 minutes to get anything I send him. Maybe the area of San Jose that he lives in just has

 

I got a Linksys router too. They are prety nice since I'm able to attach multiple computers to the same cable modem line.

It took Pacbell 5 days!!! Damn, my cable company came the same day I called them.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by yu888
[B]oh yeah, i forgot about the hacker issue... I have the Linksys router and firewall so that has helped...so far.

My Static IP was assign long ago as I have had DSL for many years now.

 

Linksys routers also make great DHCP servers. I use it for my DHCP server for my home network.