Is it the same as ADSL?

There are many ways to connect to the Internet, so what are the differences?

Dial-up

• Dial-up Modem (or normal Internet)
  Most people use this at home. You dial-up through your phone line and the data is sent at a maximum speed of 56Kbps (kilobits per second).

ISDN

• Integrated Services Digital Network
  Uses digital phone lines and connects more quickly, sending data at 64Kbps or 128Kbps.

Broadband

• ADSL
  Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line. Uses a special telephone modem and runs down traditional phone lines - you need to connect each time you switch on your computer. It is generally more expensive and much less likely to reach a maximum speed of 600Kbps than cable*.
• Cable Broadband
  Such as ntl:home Broadband Internet uses fibre optic cable. It requires no dial-up and achieves speeds of 128Kbps, 600Kbps and 1Mbps (equivilent to 1024Kbps).

* Having many users online at the same time will affect download speeds. Whereas ntl:home Broadband Internet guarantees only 20 users can ever use the same portion of the fibre-optic cable at the same time (called a 20:1 contention ratio). ADSL contention ratios can reach 50:1, making maximum data speeds more unlikely.