[JMT]

I finally got DSL installed. Man what a difference, even with my older-than-dirt PC. Now all you photo posters, post all the pics you want. I will no longer have to shave after they load.

 

[RickG]

Cool, Jon! That's next on my list! <sharpening razor>...

 

[jms007bnd007]

I live in a house with 24 other guys, and we have a business DSL line for the house. It is absolutely terrible. We are using a hub, and I'm wondering if we should switch to a router instead...Any thoughts on that from you more technically minded people out there?

 

[acs236]

Quote:

Originally posted by jms007bnd007 I live in a house with 24 other guys, and we have a business DSL line for the house. It is absolutely terrible. We are using a hub, and I'm wondering if we should switch to a router instead...Any thoughts on that from you more technically minded people out there?

A router/switch sounds like it would help. What's the speed of the DSL?

 

[jms007bnd007]

I'm not sure exactly how fast it is supposed to be. I didn't set up the account, but I'm now in charge of it. If I remember correctly its either a 1.5 or 6 Mbps connection. My computer on the other hand only registers as getting 74 kbps on the cnet bandwidth meter. I can't even play Warcraft 3 online....what am I gonna do?!?!?!

 

[andrzejpw]

huh, 24 people really sounds like you guys need a switch/router. . .

Still, 24 people sharing a 1.5 mb line. . . :-/

 

[gloco]

Quote:

Originally posted by jms007bnd007 I'm not sure exactly how fast it is supposed to be. I didn't set up the account, but I'm now in charge of it. If I remember correctly its either a 1.5 or 6 Mbps connection. My computer on the other hand only registers as getting 74 kbps on the cnet bandwidth meter. I can't even play Warcraft 3 online....what am I gonna do?!?!?!

Look into whether or not you can purchase a separate IP address. My brother and sister pay an additional $5/each for their own.

 

[Eagle_Driver]

It's been a month and a half since I got my DSL service (AOL/SBC High-Speed DSL). Right now (at this minute) I'm registering 534 kbps on the cnet bandwidth meter!

Nothing spectacular, but about what I had expected.

 

[blueocp]

It sounds like something is wrong with your DSL service 007. Is the business DSL symmetric? It should be, but at 1.5 mbps sdsl there is really no reason you should be getting only 74 mbps. Check to make sure your upload speed is the same as the download speed. 24 people using it at the same time would require maybe 768kbps, assuming everyone needs 4kbytes a second upload.
Maybe someone in the house is abusing the bandwidth the whole time? My friend at Cal Poly had the worst college connection in the world because everyone sharing the connection was running napster/morpheous/kazaa 24/7. In the end they banned all forms of those programs so I was uploading him mp3s at his request

A standard hub runs at least 10mbps for all transfers. If there is a lot of file sharing amongst your housemates then this could also be the problem. Maybe you need to upgrade your hub to either a 100mbps hub or a 10mbps switch.

 

[CaptBubba]

A switch may help, but I doubt that is the big problem. I would ask your housemates permission to check out the speed of the DSL line by disconnecting all computers but one.

A router may also be a good solution, but make sure you get one that monitors useage by Ip address. That way if one of the other people is using 90% of the bandwidth, I think you could get a pretty strong case going to make them pay for 90% of the DSL cost, especially if you have 23 other people on your side.

I think cnet's bandwidth meter is screwed up, or has an upper limit. I simply cannot break 1300kb/sec on it, even though I can download files at over 300KB/sec (2400kb/sec). Other tests return results closer to what I see in real-world downloads.

This one works well and is easy to read.
http://www.ba-hss.com/speedtest/speedtest500k.asp

My connection rated as 2985kb/sec or 369.8KB/sec.

 

[jms007bnd007]

Thanks for all the great responses. I'm going out to breakfast with a pastor from the church that owns my house tomorrow, and I'm gonna ask him for some money to upgrade our hub to a router. I'm hoping that will clear some things up. If not, well I'm only here in this house for another year, I can stick it out for that much longer, and I'm only paying about 5 dollars a month for my share of the internet service...not such a bad deal.

 

[fredpb]

The DSL speed will depend on the service type and also distance to "the telephone box" or central office.

Mine is about 1200kbps download and about 150kbps upload.

If you have 24 computers on one DSL line, you are not much better off than 56kbps on a good day. If you are all on line at the same time, forget it.

Yeah, A router would help, but 24 people? Only option is, get another telephone line with DSL installed. That would help a bit, but double your cost. More accounts or IP addresses probably would not help, just another type of line or more hard lines.

 

[grinch]

buy a 100mbit fdx switch. although, a 24-port one is going to cost some money..

a router isn't going to help. business-class dsl generally already has a block of ips with it, so they shouldn't need anymore (in general).

of course, if it were me.. i'd setup a firewall and make them share an ip, cut their bandwidth in half and give myself the rest of the ips and bandwidth.

you may also want to check the wiring that you're using. messed up cat-5 cables can cause all sorts of problems.