Everything About [Computers :: Connectivity]

Cable vs DSL

Historically, DSL has always had lower latency than Cable; Cable has always had more throughput than DSL. Now there's a new player: FIOS (fiber to the home), think 20+Mbps easy. DSL and Cable should both scale that high with time. I believe there are already a couple test markets with ~12Mbps Cable.

These days w/ latency all pretty well standardized, your decision is clearly based on pricing and availability in your local market: FIOS (~10-20Mbps) > Cable (~6-8Mbps) > aDSL (~1.5-6Mbps)

Synchronous Connections and Poor Marketing

Primary reasons for synchronous connections include (but are not limited to) VoIP, servers, and VPN connections for both remote users and offices. sDSL, sometimes wrongly marketed, is actually iDSL... which, ironically, isn't *really* even DSL at all. It's ISDN. Add to this complexity, what a provider might call an 'unprovisioned' T-circuit isn't actually a T-circuit. Often times (due to stiff competition), it's simply one or more DSL lines multiplexed (strung together).