| Read this: [ http://www.evolt.org/article/Battle_of_the_bandwidth_part_I/18/3301/ ] And here is an excerpt from it: "Here is my big thing with DSL: They'll promise you 'Near T-1 speed to the ISP!!' which is right on the money. You will always have that near T-1 speed to your ISP - no matter how many of your neighbors get the service and download pr0n mpegs. They'll get T-1 speeds to the ISP as well. It sounds great untill you've got 50 people(on the low end) with DSL at 'near T-1 speeds' connecting to an ISP that only has one T-1 to the Internet to start with.
So while you're getting T-1 speed - typically 1.5 Mps - from your computer to the ISP you get DSL from, you only can connect/download as fast as the highest amount of bandwidth your ISP has. If your ISP has a T-1 line, the maximum you can download at is T-1 speed.
Now, if your neighbor next door, or even a person on the other side of town, also has DSL and is trying to download at the same time you are, and you both have the same DSL provider, you're going to have to share bandwidth. Not bandwidth between you or them and the ISP, but between the ISP and the Internet. Also, most ISPs don't have a direct connection to the Internet as I suggest above."
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