Internet Service
Internet accounts are accessed in a variety of formats, which are characterized by their connection speeds. The important consideration for internet users is how many bits per second (bps) can be transmitted to your computer and this is known as bandwidth. A bit is essentially one letter, so bits per second is approximately how many letters per second can be transmitted down your internet connection. Because a bps is quite small, connection speed is often discussed in terms of thousands of bits per second (kilobits per second or kbps) or millions of bits per second (megabits per second or Mbps).
Broadband?
If you connect to the internet with a phone line, the computer must convert digital information to analog information or sound waves and it does this with a modem (modulator-demodulator). Traditional phone lines provided by Public Switched Telephone Networks (PSTN) provide Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS) which only carry analog signals and this are limited to 14,400 bps (14.4 kbps). Some phone companies also offer Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) service, which is a combination of copper cable and fiber optic technology that allows for greater bandwidth than POTS at a rate of 128 kbps. ISDN does not have a distance limitation like DSL because it is essentially a digital telephone line but the bandwidth decreases while the phone is also in use. Unfortunately, Bell Canada only offers ISDN as a business service and makes it very hard for the home consumer to find out more.
Broadband can mean different things to many people. For many, it is generally considered to be any connection speed 256 kbps or higher. To others, broadband is really anything higher then 56 kbps because the "band" refers to the frequencies used by the data transmission. Voice and 56K use "narrowband" frequencies where the "voice" segment of the phone line reside, which in turn limits data to a maximum speed of 53,000 bits per second. "Broadband" uses a wider band of frequencies, separate from the voice frequencies. Since it's a wider band, you can stuff more data down it. The cable companies offer broadband service that takes advantage of unused bandwidth on their cable television networks.
Although faster than 56 kbps dial-up service, ISDN is still not broadband because it uses voice frequencies. While there are two basic kinds of ISDN service in North America: Basic Rate Interface (BRI) and Primary Rate Interface (PRI). BRI is the most common for home internet service and uses two data channels rated at 64 kbps per channel plus one 16 kbps channel for signaling and control. PRI is more common for business and uses 23 64 kbps data channels and one 64 kbps control channel to carry 1.544 Mbps. You lose bandwidth to use the phone on BRI service because you drop one data channel while making a voice call. The higher speed (compared with 56K) is due to each data channel being digital. If you're one of Bell Canada's rural customers, you can forget about getting Bell's ISDN service.
Let's put connection speed into perspective. Streaming video (an internet movie) can require about 6 Mbps but can be done with as low as 56kbps. Often, downloads give you a choice of bandwidth (56k, 100k, 300k). Video conferencing (talking on the internet with a video camera) requires at least 384 kbps or preferably 768 kbps. Listening to streaming audio (an internet radio broadcast) without broadband is doable because internet radio is available with speeds as low as 8 kbps but is more commonly available in the 20-36 kbps range. However, low bandwidth streaming audio can still sound a bit choppy even with the very fastest dial-up connection. Very high quality streaming audio currently requires 100-200 kbps.
Besides streaming audio and video, file downloads are another consideration for connection speeds. Manufacturers often place their catalogs on the internet and these are available to anyone who wants to see them. A catalog can easily be anywhere from 1 MB to 50 MB in size and you will need to download a large catalog overnight with dial-up. Photos are commonly placed on discussion forum postings as part of a discussion and will download automatically as you attempt to view an individual discussion topic. A 1 MB photo will take about 1 minute to download at 128 kbps or about 3 seconds at 3 Mbps (3000 kbps). You might think "I'm retired, I can wait", but that 1 MB photo could take well over 5 minutes to view if you have dial-up service. There are literally millions (billions?) of photos on the internet and several photos are often placed in discussion topics. Do you really think you have that much time left?
Before you get too hung up about connection speeds, remember that there are other factors that affect how fast web pages appear on home computer. Obviously, the internet connection speed is a major factor. Other factors include the speed of the web page's host computer (web server), how many people want to view that file at the same time as you do, and how many people are tying up your ISP's computers. Don't expect that everything you want to do on the internet will be lightning fast all the time once you get a super quick internet connection.
Dial-Up
Dial-up access is the cheapest but slowest format and ties up your phone line. If you only need internet access for email, this is probably your most economical option. However, if you spend any time at all on the internet, dial-up's slow speed quickly becomes very annoying. The fastest dial-up modems are marketed as 56 kbps but users are very lucky to connect at anything over 50 kbps if they are close (within 5 km or 3 miles) to the telephone company's central station. The central station is where the phone company's fiber-optic cable network connects to the copper lines that end up at your house.
As an improvement to dial-up service, Slipstream has some new technology available that can quite effectively accelerate dial-up to anywhere from 5 - 9 times, which becomes competitive to basic and lite DSL offerings, but is a lot cheaper. Many ISPs have offered accelerated or "high-speed dialup" service but I think it's way too slow nowadays. Even if all you want is internet for email only, email attachments can be so large that it could take hours to download a single message. It appears that Bell Canada no longer offers dial-up internet service to rural customers but it is still offered by some other internet service providers.
DSL
The phone company and most private ISPs offer broadband through the PSTN's twisted-pair copper phone lines (ordinary phone lines that come to your house) with their Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) service. DSL carries a digital signal over the unused frequency spectrum available on the twisted pair cables running between the telephone company's central office and your house. DSL is not available to a rural customer (or anyone else) who lives more than 5 km from the central station. However, for those have access to DSL, Bell Canada offers a variety of download speeds, with both urban and rural. Private ISPs simply resell this service. If Bell doesn't have it for your home, then neither does any of the other ISPs. As each customer has a dedicated line to the central station, the connection speed remains relatively constant even at peak times.
Cable
The cable companies offer broadband service through their coaxial cables by taking advantage of the unused bandwidth on their cable television network and offer a variety of packages with a variety of maximum (no guarantee that you'll actually get this speed though) download speeds. Cable is generally available only in urban areas so rural customers can pretty much forget about this service. Because users in a cable neighborhood share the available bandwidth provided by a single coaxial cable line, the connection speed varies depending upon how many people are simultaneously using the service. Watch how fast your connection speed drops when the kids come home from school!
Wireless
The only practical alternative to dial-up service for rural customers is wireless internet. Lastmile, Neigbourhood Wireless, and cellular phone providers offer wireless internet services in the Niagara area. Lastmile offers only one level of home internet service with a sustained download speed 2 Mbps with a 130 kbps upload speed and NO usage cap. Although the Lastmile customer antennas actually communicate at 11 Mbps, the nature of radio communication effectively results in service better than Bell's Basic DSL. Neighbourhood Wireless advertises a sustained speed of 1.5Mbps download and 500 Kbps upload for its residential service with a 30 GB usage cap. For each system, users must be within range of the ISP's transmitting internet antennas and must also have an antenna installed at their house. The antenna must be in the line of sight of the ISP's antenna and this sometimes requires a antenna tower (50-70 feet tall) to clear the tree line but this doesn't necessarily apply to cellular wireless internet. The Lastmile antenna itself costs around $400 and the tower can set you back another $400 or more. Often wireless providers will charge you for the amount of data downloaded (bandwidth) so be sure about what you're getting. Even if you think that you won't need much bandwidth because all you wanted was faster email, broadband's higher speed will allow you to enjoy more data-intensive sites so your usage will likely increase as you get used to the service.
Satellite
An alternative for remote locations is satellite internet. Two satellite companies so far offer options for Canadians Hughes and Telesat. Residential rural satellite internet is typically slower than urban broadband but much faster than dial-up.
You pays your money and you takes your chances
With both DSL and cable internet, the service becomes a bit cheaper if the subscriber also buys the company's other services such as cellular phones and television. Another thing to consider when buying the service of either one is whether the additional services included are of value to you. These additional services could include parental controls, personal web space, multiple email addresses, security services, and maximum bandwidth usage. Be very careful with Cable and DSL bundling. The big companies design their bundles to trap people in their tangled webs and often involve 1 -2 year minimum contracts. As for big companies, let's not forget that Bell is famous for their lousy customer service. CBC Marketplace had an Underdogs story about John Furch's very unpleasant experience with Bell in 2006, which has since been taken down. If it looks like a really good deal, it might very well be too good to be true. Caveat Emptor!
Internet companies have been known to oversell their products, ie., promise high speed and deliver low speed. CBC Marketplace's High Speed Bumps story illustrates this scam. The internet companies plays with with words by promising UP TO speeds rather than guaranteed speeds. Subscribe to the lowest speed option of broadband internet you need because there appears to be a good chance you still be getting low speed service even though you've paid for high speed.