Enjoying a Speedy Link
To Internet, After Slow Start
By WALTER S. MOSSBERG
THERE HAS BEEN a lot of buzz lately about how the
phone companies are going to finally offer home PC users a
truly fast pipeline to the Internet. It's a technology called
DSL, for Digital Subscriber Line, and it's supposed to deliver
speeds 20 times as fast as the fastest conventional modems.
It sounds great, doesn't it?
Microsoft, Intel and Compaq are
promising that it will work. God
knows we need something to speed
up home access to the Web. It's as
slow as a White House lawyer producing incriminating
documents.
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But don't get too excited yet about the phone companies
riding to your rescue. This isn't the first high-speed Internet
connection they have promised us, and they bungled the last
one, something called ISDN, for Integrated Services Digital
Network. Just getting ISDN set up is a process full of hassles
and expenses few average users would readily endure. I know.
I just had it put into my house, and it wasn't exactly a day at
the beach.
I decided to get ISDN because
it is the only practical
high-speed Internet service
available to me -- and to
most other consumers. It
operates at 128 kilobits per
second, more than twice as
fast as the fastest standard
modems, rated at 56 kbps.
I'm not one of the 100,000
lucky souls in the U.S. who
are using a much faster service, cable modems, which run
over the same wire that brings TV to your home. Satellite
service, which I tested a few months back, proved clumsy,
costly and slower than advertised. So I went for ISDN.
First, I tried to sign up at the handy Web site run by my
phone company, Bell Atlantic. When nobody contacted me,
I called them and was served by a salesperson who was
intelligent and polite -- as were all of the Bell Atlantic
people I encountered in my saga.
AFTER ABOUT ten days, I had the first of three
installation visits from Bell Atlantic technicians. This fellow
was there merely to alter one of my existing phone lines --
the one I normally used for my old modem-so it could
eventually work with ISDN. After that, this line became
useless for regular phone and modem service during a couple
of days while I awaited the actual ISDN equipment setup.
When that great day arrived, I was ready with a special $200
ISDN modem, an obscure brand sold to me by Bell Atlantic
and shipped in advance to my house. But the diligent second
technician, who stayed for hours despite an aching back,
couldn't get the setup to work.
He returned the next day, a Saturday, with another of the
same type of modem, but this setup failed as well, despite
hours of rejiggering cables, Windows settings and modem
software. Finally, he brought in from his truck an entirely
different brand and model of ISDN modem and this one
worked.
But I still had a couple of problems. The ISDN modem took
up the only serial port on the back of my new Dell computer,
so I had to shell out extra for a special card to add another
serial port. And to fit that extra serial port into my PC, I had
to buy a different sound card. This extra gear was a hassle to
install and added another $200 or so to the $25 fee for the
installation.
AS FOR the monthly costs, they aren't cheap either. Bell
Atlantic is charging me $74 a month just for the ISDN line,
not counting Internet service itself. Plus, if in any month I
use more than 150 hours of full-speed ISDN time, or 300
hours at half speed, the company tacks on a penny or two a
minute for the extra use.
About $20 of this monthly cost is offset because I no longer
need a second regular phone line. (The ISDN service
includes a free second phone number.)
I did, however, need a special ISDN connection to the
Internet, also provided by Bell Atlantic, which costs an
added $21.95 a month. So I'm paying about $76 a month
more than I was before. And I still have to keep my old
Internet provider and regular modem for use with some
on-line services and activities where ISDN doesn't work,
such as transmitting these columns.
A few caveats are in order here. First, not all of these hassles
were Bell Atlantic's fault. The PC, Windows and other
software share heavy blame. Second, the ISDN service is
now functioning well and speedily. Third, the new DSL
service being promised by Bell Atlantic and the other phone
companies is supposed to be much simpler to hook up. For
instance, you supposedly won't need anybody to come out
and convert your phone line or to install the equipment.
But I'll believe it when I see it. |
