Pricing of ISDN versus analogue

[The_Librarian]

Hi there

I'm considering in moving over to ISDN, since analogue is a tad bit slow.

Can anybody give me the line rental and so on pricing on ISDN lines?

I want to compare the pricing to see whether I can justify in moving over to ISDN.

Many thanks

U

[brooko]

hey, you can check out the telkom website,
http://www.telkom.co.za/common/pricelist/prices/local/isdn.html is the ISDN pricelist.

There are basicly two services offered, the ISDN2 option gives you 2x 64k channels(lines) to your house, but doesnt offer voice functionality, where the ISDN2a comes with 2 anologue ports to make anologue calls over your 2 lines.

Your basicly looking at R220.50 p/m for ISDN2a, and R195.90 for ISDN2. It depends weather you want to use voice on the line aswell.. You can get a terminal adapter to use as a modem, which has analogue ports on it and then use that to plug ur analogue phone into an make calls over an ISDN2 line tho, but i'd reccomend just paying the extra R20 per month(if you can) and then you dont need to worry about an extra grand or so for the TA..

ISP pricing varies, check hellkom.co.za, they had a nice list last time i went there, or just tell ur ISP to convert ur account..

Something to remember, is that 64k ISDN(only connecting with one of the lines) downloads at a FULL 8kb/s and 128k(costs u 2 phone calls when u decide to use it) gets around 15-16k depending on ur service providor. This is because unlike normal dial-up, the line is digital, and none of the bandwidth needs to be wasted on error correction, so in many cases 64k ISDN can be almost twice the speed of dial-up..

If ur gonna go for it, try an get a 128k acc from ur Service providor, cuz then u can choose weather u want to dial in at 64k for a bit of browsing an email collection, or 128k when u need a bit of extra speed.. ISDN is obvously not capped like ADSL, but you still pay a normal call cost. If u have R7-call, or whatever its called now, keep it for ur ISDN so u can connect on fri night an disconnect on mon morning.. u'll also hardly get any dropped connections on ISDN..

Hope this helped..

[peered95]

dude, just get 192k ADSL and a 5/10GB SAOL account :)

[The_Librarian]

Mmmmm... sounds very tempting...

Will do pricing comparison before forking out lots of dough... ;)

[Skeptik]

ISDN is a redundant technology that was abandoned by the rest of the world before telkom decided to offer it as an alternative to broadband. It is a dead end - You cannot upgrade it to ADSL and the terminals (virtually given away in the UK) cannot be used for anything else.

[brooko]

ISDN is a redundant technology that was abandoned by the rest of the world before telkom decided to offer it as an alternative to broadband. It is a dead end - You cannot upgrade it to ADSL and the terminals (virtually given away in the UK) cannot be used for anything else.
Very very true, I ordered my adsl in nov, so i'm now waiting for an install date itll kinda be good to be rid of it. I suppose the worring about how much i've downloaded will get to me..

[disabled]

Yeh Yeh...ADSL is the way to go but if they don't want to give it to you then you have no choice like me for instance by the time I get aaaADSL people will be flying to Mars for a vocation...