[ale] DSL reccs?

Keith R. Watson keith.watson at gtri.gatech.edu
Tue Jul 27 13:05:44 EDT 1999


At 11:48 AM 7/27/99 -0400, you wrote:
>
>Can anyone provide any reccomendations for a [AS]DSL provider?
>Good service?  Bad service?
>
>We would like to host our "family" domain (butera.org, currently with
>a webhosting service) at home with static IP, as well as handle our
>own email.  Unfortunately, MediaOne's @home contact specifically
>prohibits running any type of server, so the cable modem is not an
>option.
>
>Looking at our server stats and typical usage for email/surfing, we're
>easily under 2Gb/month (maybe under 1 Gb/month) in terms of data
>rates.
>
>Thanks in advance.
>
>--
>Robert Butera, Assistant Professor       
>School of Electrical and Computer Engineering		
>Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0250	
>contact info --> http://www.ece.gatech.edu/users/rbutera/ 

Robert,

Funny you should ask this question as I have been looking for the same
thing. There are two xDSL ISP's in Atlanta, that I have found so far, that
provide multiple static IP's and allow you to run servers.

Speakeasy.net

   Home Page
      http://www.speakeasy.net/

   Terms of Service
      http://www.speakeasy.net/dsl/terms.html

   Pricing
      http://www.speakeasy.net/bizpricing.html

I have talked to Speakeasy and surmised the following. If my line will not
support ADSL (according to Bellsouth.net it won't because I'm on an SLC
"slick") it may be able to support IDSL. This costs more and only provides
144k/144k but that's better than ISDN and certainly better than 56k modem.
IDSL is "always on" just like ADSL. They will provide up to 8 static IP's
and will allow me to register my own domain with them for an additional
$14.95 a month. If I register with Internic my self and set up and maintain
my own name server then there is no additional monthly charge. NAT is fine
with them and I found them to be very Linux friendly.


Flashcom

   Home Page
      http://www.flashcom.com/

I just looked at their web site the other day. A friend told me this
morning that they have a very similar plan to Speakeasy's, but I haven't
checked them out yet. I can't say what they really provide other than to
pass on the rumor.


The big picture looks like this. There are independent xDSL providers (not
Bell) that give you the actual xDSL connection. The xDSL providers market
their services through partner ISP's. The ISP determines the terms of
service (AUP) and costs. So far I have identified about a half dozen xDSL
providers. Speakeasy and Flashcom are both ISP partners with Covad. 

   Covad Home Page
      http://www.covad.com

   Business ISP partners in Atlanta (beware line wrap on URL)

http://www.covad.com/connect/Regional_ISPs-TeleSpeed/Atlanta_ISP_TeleSpeed.h
tml

   Residential ISP partners in Atlanta (beware line wrap on URL)

http://www.covad.com/connect/Regional_ISPs-TeleSurfer/Atlanta_ISP_TeleSurfr.
html


I've been working on a cross reference of Atlanta xDSL
providers/ISP's/AUP's, but it is not finished yet.


To summarize, this is what I think should be available:

Cost $49 to $99 per month

Speed 144k/144k on the low end to 768k/384k on the high end (down link
speed/up link speed) You can get faster but costs exceed $100/month.

2 email accounts (can run your own mail server with unlimited accounts)

news server (could do this too if you had a burning desire)

multiple static IP addresses

free domain name (you provide DNS)

AUP (acceptable use policy) allows servers (host commercial pages if you want)

NO BANDWIDTH LIMITS (had to shout so the Bell types would here this,
apparently they haven't discovered that this is going to be a key point to
getting people to use the service. Did you hear that Bellsouth.net)


Mindspring - The last announcement they emailed me said that they may be
partnering with Covad, and may have service this fall, maybe. Cost, AUP,
and service areas have not been determined yet. I'm sorry to say that all
my efforts to talk to someone concerning what a customer might like to see
have fallen on deaf ears. I had the mistaken impression that since I do
research in remote networking and have been using Mindspring since the
first day they started that I might be able to get *some* info. Well I
guess that's why they call it competition.

Please let the rest of us know what you find out.

keith
-------------

Keith R. Watson                        GTRI/AIST
Computer Services Specialist IV        Georgia Institute of Technology
keith.watson at gtri.gatech.edu           Atlanta, GA  30332-0816
404-894-0836






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