Which ISP should I choose?

jdjoubert said:
Now THAT was fast and Very helpful. Thanx allot Paul_S.

I will go search now. Oh, do you maby know how far one can be from the router, or up to what length the cable can be. I am thinking of moving my office to the flat that is next to my house. 50m odd length. So either the router will be in my office, or it will be in my house, with a wire leading to my office. I know its off toppic.. srry..:o
Click to expand...

The maximum recommended length when using Cat 5 UTP is 100m for both Fast Ethernet (100baseT) and Gigabit Ethernet (1000baseT).
Beyond that and you could start running into problems such as interference from mains cables and crosstalk.

50 meters is no problem but it depends on where you want to lay the cable.
If long lengths are going to be routed next to mains cables or through roofs then you may want to use STP (Shielded Twisted Pair) instead of UTP (Unshielded Twisted Pair). I've seen the static from lightning take out a network card because there was about 30 meters of UTP run through a ceiling. A nice little antenna ...
 
Could the heat from a glue gun hurt a cable? i took a 20m cable and hooked up a pc in a bedroom to a switch in the lounge and it worked fine, but then when i glued it to the wall it stopped working.. I tried it again and same thing happened, is it the heat from the glue, or perhaps bending the cable too sharply in the corners??
 
MrG said:
Cable will always be the most stable but as far as I am aware a wireless network 802.11g for home use wont increase your ping that much. I would again however call upon someone that has proper experience with this. I am pretty convident it wont make a difference. Consider that on my ADSL 4MBit line I get 64ms ping using an ISDSL account to games.saix.net and using Vodacom HSDPA I get 82ms to games.saix.net. The difference will be there but not that great, and this is using a much larger range wireless network, I am certain a normal home wireless network wont make an increase of 20ms.

However cable is always the best. The more walls and longer the distance the weaker slower and less responsive the connection will be.
Click to expand...

Im using a wireless isp and when i ping games.saix.net i get an avarage of 120ms. Not bad for a for a line thats 1/4 the speed of your 4mb line and also there is no cap for usage on the line
 
ocean-addict said:
Could the heat from a glue gun hurt a cable? i took a 20m cable and hooked up a pc in a bedroom to a switch in the lounge and it worked fine, but then when i glued it to the wall it stopped working.. I tried it again and same thing happened, is it the heat from the glue, or perhaps bending the cable too sharply in the corners??
Click to expand...

Twisting and bending can some times hurt the cable but ive never heard of that a glue gun gan hurt the cable, i hooked up my pc in my room with the one in the bar its about 40meters and i also used a glue gun and nothing happend. I can be wrong
 
Just to get us back on subject. I purchased 2Gig Prepaid from WebAfrica yesterday.
And I have to say that I'm very very impressed. It was hardly 2minutes when they phoned me and told me that I'm all ready to go. And best of all, they threw in a extra 2Gigs for free!
Don't know if they do it for all new customers or if its just a mistake on their side, or they just like me. :cool:
 
Hi guys

I am new at this & I have read the forum, I got telkom to activate my ADSL line, & I bought a Billion 7300 modem/router.

I was interested in taking a 3/27 gig package,as i do sum emailing & downloading (not excessive downloading though), but I am not sure as to which ISP I should use. Can sum1 please recommend a reliable 1. =)

I saw things like the concurrent connection between 1 & 4, does that make a diff?
 
OpenWeb or WebAfrica are both decent options for the 3/27GB accounts. Concurrent connections just means the amount of active session you can have on different computers.

If you are connecting through a router you will only have one active connection.
 
Hi all

was wondering what's the best account and isp to go for when playing guild wars online, me and 2 friends usually share a 1gb unshaped from OpenWeb, but its so expensive :P any ideas?
 
ISP Costs

Thanks for all the info but what about Saol.com.
Their entry level package including the line rental, bandwith, router, .co.za domain & 10Megs hosting on a 384K line is R 189.00 per month.
 
Thanks for the info but what about Saol.com.
They have an entry level package for R 189.00 per month that includes, telkom line rental (384K), 1gig bandwidth, 4 port ADSL router, .co.za domain, webhosting (10Megs) and 5 mailboxes.
 
I am investigating ADSL options for a novice user.
The solution should be simple to use after initial setup, providing ADSL connectivity for a desktop and laptop, both running WinXP.

Usage requirements are:
1. Casual internet browsing (local & international), including a fair bit of Google Earth usage (which I guess is international traffic).
2. POP3 Mailbox (a few aliases nice to have). Domain & web hosting NOT required.
3. Local radio streaming (specifically from http://www.fmr.co.za )

384kbps ADSL should be fine, but now for the correct data package, ISP and nework setup.

Prepaid package makes sense (usage will be sporadic).

A fair bit of local data will be required for the radio streaming.
Unfortunately the 3GB/29GB combination packages does not look like it will work, since my understanding is that you need to use up the international 3GB before the local 29GB kicks in. Correct?

So looks like 2 separate prepaid accounts are required (international and local).
Can this be implemented seamlessly on 2 PCs behind a single modem/router using a single line?

As far as I understand, a modem in bridge mode with route sentry running on each PC behind the modem will be required. Correct?
And if 2 PCs will be used, each prepaid account will need to allow a minimum of 2 concurrent connections.
I hope it will be possible to set this up for automatic logon when the PCs are turned on.

Is my thinking above correct?
Any other setups I need to be considering?
Thanks for any suggestions.
 
Broadband for granny

Hi there,
i know forum etiquette dictates that I should do a search but have found South African adsl quite confusing. local and international, SAIX and IS, pre-paid, shaped, telcom prices etc?
I live in Australia and my mom, who is a pensioner, lives in Wynberg. I would like to recommend an ISP for her as she is currently on dial-up.

Her requirements are:
cheap (pensioner, remember)
reliable (can get cranky and lose all common sense)
384kbps
1GB data
email
web browsing
IM
skype
voip (possibly)
blogging (kidding)
She has family in Aus, NZ and US and we would like to be able to use Skype to speak to each other.

So what are her options. I have had a look at webafrica and they look ok, but was wondering about other member's recommendations.

cheers
pitty
 
SAIX Prepaid, prepaid accounts get carried over for 12 months so this will be the cheapest if she's not going to use it alot.

You could also take a look at Cybersmart, they have a 3GB offering priced at R125 on a 384 line.
 
pitty said:
Her requirements are:
cheap (pensioner, remember)
skype
voip (possibly)
She has family in Aus, NZ and US and we would like to be able to use Skype to speak to each other.
Click to expand...

You want 1GB of data but you want to use Skype...:eek: Skype can eat Data. Don’t go for any IS account (satellite based - latency).
I would strongly recommend Cybersmart then. Look for their "One price ADSL":
384k ADSL Line rental + 1GB CAP -> R169
384k ADSL Line rental + 3GB CAP -> R259
You even get a free modem with them!
They are the cheapest you will get in South Africa if you use more than +-500MB per month. If your usage is lower than that, I would rather go with a WA SAIX prepaid account (R70/GB that rolls over indefinitely + R152/pm ADSL line rental).
 
WebAfrica...No 2 ways about it ;)
No "contracts", nothing...If you decide 2 leave these guys ( which i doubt you would ), you can do so without any hassles...I'm with these guys for the past 3 years now without any ****...very reliable...
 
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