Re: Broadband

[Jeff Licquia <jeff@luci.org>]

On Mon, Apr 24, 2000 at 11:18:59AM -0500, Steven Pritchard wrote:
> 
> Jeff Licquia said:
> > Some of these issues are reported to be solved (or at least not as
> > bad) with PPPoE.  Then again, this being the Midwest, I'm sure PPPoE
> > won't make it this way for another few years, seeing as how it's
> > relatively new.
> 
> On the contrary...  All the cheap DSL equipment apparently uses PPPoE.
> (Oh, and just so you know, Ted Ts'o referred to PPPoE as "the
> abomination also known as PPP over Ethernet (PPPOE)" in
> <200004210329.XAA28130@tsx-prime.MIT.EDU>, posted to linux-kernel.)

Hmm... I hadn't heard this.  I was given the line that PPPoE is
supposed to make cable access a little more secure.

Far be it from me to second-guess Ted Ts'o, though.

> > Right this second (in Springfield, anyway), cable is going to kick
> > DSL's little butt all over the mat bandwidth-wise.  The problem, as
> > you say, is what happens when the service gets popular.  Got a
> > neighbor like me?  Too bad. :-)
> 
> Are you really sure about that?  Honestly, how much high-bandwidth
> downloading do you really do?

Nightly mirrors of ftp.debian.org over rsync, constrained to potato
i386 binaries only because it was taking nearly 18 hours to complete.
I'm only considering mirroring source now because potato is changing a
lot less.

(Why, you say?  To build CD images and test potato boot-floppies.)

Plus the occasional ISO download, and package uploads, the usual mail,
Web, IRC, MP3, etc. stuff.

Did I mention I'm considering becoming the Debian maintainer of
Gnubile, the GTK+ Gnutella client?

'Nuff said. :-)

> > Also, cable sucks because of the Acceptable Use Policies they
> > typically carry.  Because of the shared bandwidth issues, they
> > typically get really pissed whenever you do anything interesting, like 
> > run Napster.
> 
> The cheap DSL providers have some of the same bandwidth issues, so I
> wouldn't be at all surprised if they have the same AUPs.  Plus, from
> what I hear, most of the cheap DSL providers are fascists about IP
> addresses...  One of the benefits they apparently get from PPPoE is
> being able to force an address change on occasion.

I've never understood that.  You have to allocate an IP to each user
24/7 anyway; who cares if it changes?  DynDNS is truly your friend.

I'm really surprised that the cable and DSL crowd isn't pushing IPv6
big time.

> > I saw that Cox, for example, charges extra for *upload*
> > bandwidth usage over a certain level (it strikes me that it was
> > 250MB/month, but I could be wrong).
> 
> Could be.  AT&T doesn't have any such restrictions, or if they do
> they're not advertised obviously.  (Since I transferred a gig or two
> of mp3s to my work box the other day, I'd hope they don't have any
> such policy.  ;-)

We'll find out, now, won't we? :-)


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