In choosing an internet connection, it is very important to consider
your location and specially your budget. There are a lot of choices that
can be considered. However, it is a common denominator among people,
whether they utilize the internet for work or play, to opt for with a
fast web connection.
Dial-up
The
dial-up or the
Analogue can be
considered as the poor man’s connection because it is believed to the
cheapest and slowest internet connection. It has the speed of up to
56kbs and uses an Internet Service Provider (ISP), cable and a modem to
translate the analogue data. With this, the user needs to dial a phone
number to the ISP in order to be connected. Moreover, the modem
translates the said analogue data into digital which can be understood
by the user.
DSL
On the other hand, a
DSL connection, unlike the
analogue, does not need dialling up to an ISP. It is an internet access
that is on all the time. All you need to do is plug the two-wire
telephone cable and you are already connected. With this type of
connection, there are also various subtypes like SDSL, ADSL and VDSL.
All these subtypes however work the same.
TV Cable modem
Another form of internet connection is the
Cable modem which
is relatively faster than the previous types. It has a speed of 512kbs
to 20Mbps and uses television lines to be able to connect into the
internet. Compared to telephone lines, cable TV uses coaxial cables
which provide higher bandwidth.
Broadband and Optical
Broadband is a connection that does not need a modem in order to be
able to connect unlike other types of connections and is believed to be
the most reliable. Talking about cable connection, there is another type
called
Optical Cable that can reach a speed of
16Gbps+. It is fiber-optic and has the highest data rates compared to
the other common internet connection and is fairly easy to maintain.
Satellite
Meanwhile, a connection over
Satellite is stable
however; it has a slower speed than that of broadband because of its
distance. This type of connection uses a communication satellite that is
positioned in the orbit that provides an uninterrupted connection but
due to its very far distance from the users, it transmits data slower
than normal.
Tier Carrier
Further, there is a type of internet connection that can be connected to the backbone of the internet itself. You can research t1 service providers online. This is the kind of connection that is used by ISP.
Tier Carrier
has subtypes that vary in speed and number of individual channels that
they carry. With the T-1 line, it can carry up to 26 individual channels
while T-3 can carry up to 672 and with a speed not slower but can be
higher than 43Mbps. A T-5 however has the speed of up to 400Mbps. This
kind of connection is impractical to be used by home-based computer
sets.
Internet2
Moreover, if you think you have the fastest connection, think again.
Today, there is this type of connection that can reach a speed of up to
100Gbps.
Internet2 is believed to be the world’s
fastest internet connection and it really feels different to have this
kind of connection. This was developed through the effort of a
networking consortium to provide a high internet speed for education and
research purposes. Still, it remains an alien thing to have such a
connection.
