Author Topic: T1 vs DSL vs Cable (Read 3326 times)

Pride · « **on:** March 13, 2006, 01:32:05 PM »

Greetings all!

I need some advice, and if lucky, some stats.

My company currently has Comcast Business (7MB) Internet. It serves us pretty well, and really cannot complain. However, we would like to increase our upload speed (we have a branch site that needs to upload files to our server now and again) Currently Comcast has a 768K upload max.

The idea of a T1 would be to increase our upload speed. But would also not want to lose any download speed.

I have done extensive research, and just am not getting the answers I am needing.

I understand that T1 is very reliable and whatnot.

We are talking about taking this possible T1 and dynamically splitting it (forgive the lack of proper terminology) so that we may get 10-12 phone lines for VOIP.

What I need to know is if our download speed is going to suffer when going from Comcast's 7.0 MB down to a T1 (Qwest) 1.5

I'd love to hear your opinions on this... especially if you are in the IT field and have gone through this switch in the past. What reasons you had for switching, what the costs were, and if you are happy since switching.

Thanks all!

TekieB · « **Reply #1 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:43:15 PM »

I'm assuming the budget isn't there to load balance the connections?
How much are you "realistically" pulling download wise?

Maybe you could downgrade the cable (to whatever comcast offers in the 3-5mbit down range) and load balance. Have you talked to comcast at all about the possibility of increasing the upload speed?

The Shoctor · « **Reply #2 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:44:37 PM »

Touch my FATPIPE

That would be the best solution, if you have the bling!

Xincom makes a dual wan router but STAY AWAY FROM THEM!! THEY ARE THE WORST PEOPLE I HAVE EVERY DELT WITH! They were telling me it was a configuration error when the damn unit out of the box would keep rebooting.

As for the other dual wan routers I have had luck with the hawking, but others seem to disagree...

Now I have this feeling Tekie will chime in about building one, but I have never been able to get Zebra functioning properly. Not saying it doesn't work, it just isn't the easiest task in the world.

Pride · « **Reply #3 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:47:36 PM »

If that fatpipe is more expensive than a T1, forget it... it was hard enough to get them to even consider T1 pricing!

The Shoctor · « **Reply #4 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:48:23 PM »

You could do what I have done here. If the out going is mostly for your servers and the download your users, I use two gateways.. This isn't for redundancy just for getting the most out of things.

TekieB · « **Reply #5 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:48:36 PM »

i was gonna suggest the linksys RV series, i've read good things about them, and the RV016 can do up to 7 wan interfaces
sonicwall also offers dual wan models, but i'm not as familiar with them (but they seem a level up from linksys)

building a box for dual WAN is a PITA, and if you are using it for a buisness i'd rather buy something with a support contract and such, there is a differnce between mission critical buisness and hoby/lans

Pride · « **Reply #6 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:49:28 PM »

Quote from: "TekieB"

I'm assuming the budget isn't there to load balance the connections?
How much are you "realistically" pulling download wise?

Maybe you could downgrade the cable (to whatever comcast offers in the 3-5mbit down range) and load balance. Have you talked to comcast at all about the possibility of increasing the upload speed?

I am not aware of any true load balancing technology. I know there is redundancy, but I thought that load balancing doesn't actually work?

If you send a packet out one modem, and its reply comes back to the other modem, then you have problems.

The Shoctor · « **Reply #7 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:51:34 PM »

This is true. The FATPIPE and the Linksys Try to figgure out the load between the two pipes based on what you say thier throughput is. The FATPIPE is better at it because it works well with incoming things since it becomes your companies outside DNS authority and can give people different IPs to get to the same thing.

The Shoctor · « **Reply #8 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:53:43 PM »

The only way to get the FULL deal is to get the pipe bonded, but that will NEVER happen between two different companies. Hence you can get two T1s and bond them for a full 3 both ways instead of going all out for a T3.. but then again it's all the same they just keep tacking on channels. Until you go optical, but that is a different ball of wax.

TekieB · « **Reply #9 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:56:17 PM »

I also thought with load balancing you could do QOS type things where you say "route VOIP over the T1 (wan1) with the high upload" "route http over cable (wan2) with the high download"

I'm no where near as familiar with this stuff as shadow is, I just know it exists

sully! · « **Reply #10 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:57:39 PM »

<Unbiased opinion>
If you are going from a 7MB down to a 1.5MB down, you WILL lose a lot of d/l speed. At my last job we were on a T1 at our temporary offices until ours were finished being built and the speeds were not that impressive. We were lucky to break 60K down. And if I'm reading you correctly, you want to take some of the channels of the T1 and dedicate them to VoIP, thereby reducing your available data speeds, possibly to 768kbps. Now you're at basement DSL speeds which is just silly.
</unbiased opinion>

I'll PM you my biased opinion.

EDIT: When I started typing there were no other responses, and then that --^ happened. Wow! It's a text explosion

The Shoctor · « **Reply #11 on:** March 13, 2006, 01:58:42 PM »

That's pretty much how you can dictate traffic on those routers. True load blancing well... You know that bling I was talkin 'bout? Else you are stuck with the guesstimation math.

Dwg115 · « **Reply #12 on:** March 13, 2006, 02:49:17 PM »

I used to work for CTSI in harrisburg and i sold those T+ lines ( those are the ones that you can separate some phone lines off the T) the probelem with doing that is that a T1 is essentially 24 phone lines and i you take 12 off, your left with half a T. 768/768kbps your upload is the same and your download is greatly reduced. I would check your vendor and see if they have a really fast DSL product that fits your needs. Hell maybe even Comcast has a faster product. if money is unlimited get a damn T3 it'll solve all problems. OC 192's are good too!!!

seriously though,
check companys like choice one communications, XO communications, CTSI, Adelphia communications, thses companies are extrememly competitive just be aware sometimes they give better pricing at longer contracts.

T1's are priced at the distance you are from their switch so if your close you could get an awesome deal.

Dave

The Shoctor · « **Reply #13 on:** March 13, 2006, 04:50:53 PM »

I would love to have an OC192, but I don't think they will fork out cash for the run or the switching equipment... But 9.8 Gbps would be nice.

TekieB · « **Reply #14 on:** March 13, 2006, 04:56:24 PM »

Quote from: "ShadoHawk"

I would love to have an OC192, but I don't think they will fork out cash for the run or the switching equipment... But 9.8 Gbps would be nice.

think of all the "videos" you could get with that connection