E-Business
Issue No. 17 - June/July 2004
The Skinny on Broadband
by Adrian de Brenni
Everyone understands Broadband – don’t they! After all, we are flooded with advertisements and offers so there is plenty of information out there. Advertisements – yes. Support and easy to understand information – no. The message coming through from many businesses and individuals is that they would like it explained clearly. They also need support if they are going to buy it. And they want to know the benefits.
What is Broadband?
Broadband is a term used to describe a type of connection from a computer to the Internet. The most common type of connection is currently ‘dial-up’, which is not broadband. Dial-up is where the computer is connected to the Internet through a telephone service. The connection is made by ‘dialling’ a telephone number provided by the company that sells the Internet service (the Internet Service Provider – or ISP). When you use your telephone service for a dial up Internet connection your line is ‘busy’ and you can’t use it to make telephone calls while your computer is connected to the Internet.
A broadband connection is quite different for two main reasons:
- Using it doesn’t stop you making or receiving telephone calls. This means that it can be left connected (called ‘always on’) as long as your computer is on. In comparison a dial-up connection would have to be disconnected when you needed to use the phone.
- It allows a much faster transfer of information between the computer and the Internet.
This transfer rate is known as ‘bandwidth’ and is why higher-speed connections get the name broadband. Dial-up services are sometimes referred to as narrowband.
A typical comparison between broadband and dial-up is that if you were using the Internet to receive a 100 page document, say a report with text, pictures, tables and charts, it will take 30 about seconds with a dial-up service, but less than one second with a broadband service.
Supp...
