Hi Tim I wanted to send something to you earlier but have been busy.
You have been well advised so far but one warning has been missing - Telstra cable BB still, as far as I know, requires some software to initiate and maintain the network connection. This is commonly known as heartbeat. Telstra has announced that it will be phased out but I don't know when that will begin or end - they have promised in the past and not delivered so far. So, there are broadband routers on the market that have the heartbeat client built in. Netgear and Linksys for sure and perhaps others. So, if you plug your 4 port ADSL router in it is highly unlikely it will initiate and maintain the network connection. Certainly it will act as a switch and wireless access point but won't bring up the cable connection. It may be that heartbeat is already gone but I'd be surprised. A great web site to check for this and other very useful tips wrt cable BB is the Oz Cable Guy www.ozcableguy.com Here is his news on the subject 28/8/06 No more BigPond Heartbeat? It's finally happened! After many rumours spanning at least the last 3 years, BigPond have finally officially announced that the heartbeat system is to be slowly phased out over the next 9-12 months. What this means is once you receive the email from BigPond advising that your account has changed over to the new system you will need to change from using the old login client which requires a username and password to using no login client at all (DHCP client). The system recognises you by your modem in the same manner as the Optus Cable system. However, just like Optus when connecting a new router for the first time the previous connection can get hung up. To get around this you need to switch the modem and router off for a few seconds then back on and maybe wait for 15 minutes or so, or you can get tricky by spoofing the previous Mac address. See Whirlpool for more, or go to Telstra's FAQ about the new billing system. I hope that helps. Also, on the bits, bytes, nibbles and words (2 bytes or 16 bits - thought I'd add that in), yes, 8 bits to a byte but, when sent over ADSL and IP there are lots of overheads. When your data is sent it is put in an IP packet with a header (up to 40 bytes), the payload of up to 1518 bytes (your data) and a CRC (4 bytes I think). Then you are probably using PPPoE somewhere so there's the PPP overhead (don't know what that is). Oh, forgot the IP packet is in an Ethernet packet somewhere. ADSL uses ATM so each of your PPPoE packets get segmented into 53 octet (the ATM term for 8 bits or a byte) cells each with a 5 octet header. So, although your line might be quoted at 24Mbps (or what ever speed) you will never ever see a download that fast because of all of the overheads. Cheers Greg > From: Tim Law <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Date: Sun, 24 Dec 2006 21:14:07 +0900 > To: WAMUG Mailing List <[email protected]> > Subject: Re: Cable Broadband > > Hi all, > > THANKS for the time and explanations of my Cable query. > >> 12) Re: Cable Broadband >> by Adam Hewitt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >> 17) Re: Cable Broadband >> by Martin Hill <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Adam's explanation was really helpful - there appears to be a high > likelihood my existing wireless 4 port ADSL router and network will just > plug in to a cable modem with an ethernet cable and need a few tweaks. > > And Martin's essay was truly breathtaking :-) > And here was me thinking the ISP's were trying to confuse us with big > numbers! Oh, and thanks for your faith Martin, I DID mean to type 8 bits > to a byte, not 6 bits to a byte. > > Martin, I guess my 11082 (Kbps.) translates to 11.082 Mbps and therefore is > a whole lot better than your 1.3Mbps, so by the sound of it I'm pretty well > off and should stay quiet and have a nice warm glow of satisfaction! > > Thanks Bob for the off list comments and searching to try to find answers. > > So summarising what I have figured out - as far as the net connection goes, > I really might as well stay with what I have. The cable costs $59.95 per > month and I'll get the same speed, give or take a hot breeze, as what I'm > getting on the iinet DSLAM at $39.95 per month. > > My decisions to switch to Telstra will now rest on the rest of the package, > but at least I understand the impact on my Mac centric network. > > Ta > Tim > > > -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- > Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> > Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> > Unsubscribe - <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >
