The Best Broadband ISPs in America

DSL: Broadband Bargain

DSL service is slower than cable on average, with home users typically getting downstream speeds that max out at 6 mbps--about where cable begins. Dirt-cheap prices, however, make DSL an ever more popular choice.

With DSL often costing as little as--or even less than--dial-up, will prices continue to drop? No. "They're pretty much at the threshold of what's doable from a business perspective," says JupiterResearch's Laszlo.

Corey Smith, an electrophysiologist at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, has been an AT&T Yahoo customer for a little over two years. He pays $18 a month for the AT&T Yahoo Pro package, which tops out at 3 mbps. "It's been reliable, easy, and cheap, and it's a great deal for the price," Smith says. For him, DSL is the best broadband option, particularly because he doesn't have or want cable TV. Smith now pays $11 less per month than he did when he first subscribed to AT&T Yahoo--and his connection is faster.

But in some regions, DSL is far from perfect. Ralf Cross is a computer systems administrator in Charleston, Tennessee, a tiny town near Chattanooga with fewer than 800 people. Cross pays about $40 a month for BellSouth DSL, which delivers what she calls "intermittent" broadband service. "Sometimes you can connect, sometimes you can't," complains Cross, who believes the town's old phone lines are to blame. "You just kind of hobble along and say, 'Well, this is better than dial-up.'" But if cable broadband comes to Charleston, she says she'll switch ISPs in a second. BellSouth subscribers who answered our survey were, on average, satisfied with the service; however, the provider may soon merge with AT&T Yahoo, whose subscribers weren't nearly as happy in our survey.

Three-fourths of our survey respondents said it was "unlikely" that they would switch to a new ISP in the next six months. But of those who said they might, nearly a third, like Cross, said they want a more reliable connection.

Click the image below to see survey results on how much people pay for their broadband.