I’m looking to get ADSL from either one of these companies, but don’t know which to go for. I guess I’m mainly surfing US-based sites, filesharing, and playing online games based on US servers (WoW, baby!)
Looking for the 2M/256K service. Any thoughts or experiences you’d like to share? Cast your vote!
I’m going shopping with a friend this weekend and will post the results. I have Hinet right now and have been very happy with performance (except for the fact I can’t get into some of the popular IRC groups).
We have So-net, and so far the performance is good. No problems or what so ever. I get 200K downloads from the ntu servers and netmeeting conferences to the US or Europe work amazingly good. I tried a little online gaming (BF42) and got ping times of under 30ms. I am not sure where the server is located though.
I’m sharing a connection with my neighbors right now, but my audio is horrible with MSN Messenger, Skype and other programs. I think the problem is because there’s 3 computers on the line so I’m thinking of buying my own line. Does it matter which internet I purchase? I’m in a small city outside of Chay-yi called Douliou. I’m not sure which connection speed to purchase or if it will make a difference. I can’t afford much and will be leaving in August.
Did you try optimizing you cables? Before I came, my roomate had an incredible long cable between his phone/DSL outlet and the splitter, I was supprised that anything made it through, after optimizing the cable length the speed was increased noticeable. Unless you neighbors are down-/uploading large files all the time, or while you are on messenger or Skype, you should have no problems. At peak times 4 people in our appartment are using the internet, and I can still use internet applications just fine.
Do you mean that my cable length may be causing the audio quality problems? I never thought about that until now, but I guess you’re probably right. We’re running a very long cable from here to our neighbor’s house. About 35 - 40feet I think.
Ethernet is spec’d to go up to 100 meters without problems on the proper cabling. On good cables it’ll go further than that before you get dropped packets. You can extend it even further by putting a switch or repeater in the middle, or by using fiber optic ethernet which can go several miles.
The phone cabling for ADSL can go typically 3-5 miles depending on the type of technology used, sometimes further for newer stuff. The problem is that it needs twisted pair cabling, while most inside phone extension cables have untwisted cabling. If the cable is round it is probable twisted and if it is flat it is untwisted. High frequency signals degrade over untwisted cabling pretty quickly, so if you want to extend ADSL lines a good distance you should only use twisted pair cabling. The alternative is to put the ADSL modem near the jack and run ethernet out to the computers.
As for the poll, I’m happily on So-net for a couple of years now and the performance is always very good for me, even for VOIP. I’m currently at 2m/512k service. The only problem has cropped up in the last couple of months. Some p2p networks are banning So-net connections because the ISP is owned by Sony and they are afraid we’re all piracy cops. Oddly enough even p2p sites that appear to only have legal content use that blacklist! Unfortunately even more sites block Hinet because of hacking, open proxies, spammers, etc. and there’s plenty of other p2p networks that don’t block So-net.
I’ve dedided to go with the Hinet in the end. Turns out that I need to install a new phone line to get ADSL, since the existing phone line isn’t under my name. Hinet offered to install this new phone line for free, so it was just easier to go with them. I opted for the 2M/256K service b/c the attendant told me that the 8M/640K service is not “stable”. I guess it depends on how many people are on at that particular moment? Who knows. It was only a little more than the 2M/256K, so there must have been some sort ot catch. One forum member is very happy with his service, though.
I put in my application yesterday and will let everyone know how it goes. Thanks again!
The Hinet guys came by this morning to install ADSL - only 2 days after I applied for the service! I tested the speeds briefly and it seems similar to the EBT cable service I used before. Will do some more extensive testing tonight.
Tested out Hinet a bit last night, and now WoW is playable!! No more 6000+ ping. Very sweet.
Only thing left to test is filesharing, which I’ll get around to as soon as I clean out some of the crap offa my hard drive. Very happy with the service so far.