Syzygv78,
The technology doesn't really work that way. The ADSL lines are not actually 512kbps, so just splitting one wouldn't give you 256kbps, they are really 6MB, but are limited to 2MB because Telkom use G.Lite and not G.DMT, and then artificially limited to 512kbps by routers just beyond the DSLAM. You couldn't really split an ADSL line either, it just doesn't work that way. Even if it did, it would make no sence for Telkom to do that. The line rental you pay is actually not for the 512kbps line, but for the full 2MB line. Then, you also pay for a PPPoE connection which is limited to 512kbps. If they did introduce this, you would probably pay R100 per month for the PPPoE connection, but would still be paying the same line rental.
kaspaas,
As I've stated on an old post long ago, they wouldn't really consider a service like that, since they already sell it. It's called analogue leased line access. Basically, you get Telkom to lay a dedicated copper line between you and your ISP. If you happen to live in the same exchange as your ISP's PoP, this will cost you about R180 per month. If you are in a different exchange, you need to rent repeaters too, which drives it up to R350 per month. I used a R350 per month analogue leased line to a local ISP for about three years, of course, I got IP access for free because I was the systems administrator at the time.
Your problem here isn't Telkom, since they do actually offer this service, but the South African ISPs. ISPs in general are not willing to allow users to connect analogue leased lines to their PoPs. Those who do offer the service, often expect very expensive monthly fees. This is because a leased line customer is always connected, and can really drive up the ISP's bandwidth bill. A "flat rate dial-up" option would infuriate South African ISPs, since they simply can not afford the kind of bandwidth and infrastructure that they would need to cope with this, and would have no controle over users just connecting and staying connected. My guess, this would lead to ISPs resetting your connection every few hours, just to try and ward off users who dial up and abuse their networks.
If Telkom do introduce such a service, they would have to lower the cost of bandwidth to ISPs, which we all know, they will never do, since they make a lot of money out of Diginet, and don't want to let go of that any time soon.
Willie Viljoen
Web Developer
Adaptive Web Development
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