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Can You Control the Speed?

A typical 384-kbps connection may be all you really need, since hardly any media is saved at more than 300 kbps. But a faster connection can allow you to take advantage of occasional bursts of Internet throughput. Such bursts are more common late at night or early in the morning. On the East Coast, I've usually found fairly smooth sailing until midafternoon.

I have a 400-MHz Pentium II with a 640-kbps Bell Atlantic Infospeed DSL service that runs at a steady 480 kbps. That's about the average broadband experience--a bit less than the usual cable modem service and a bit more than the average DSL line. My back channel is downright wimpy at 90 kbps. The higher your downstream bandwidth, the more your real-world upstream bandwidth is reduced by handshaking overhead. At 480 kbps, my actual upstream channel is considerably less than 90 kbps.

That bit of news came to me by way of DSLReports.com, a useful independent site that gives you the straight scoop on all things broadband (and provides a lively forum for users to gripe about their installation nightmares).

The site also provides a speed check, an index of broadband-ready sites, and speed tips. For example, I discovered that frequently clearing your browser's disk and memory caches helps to smooth the playback of large video files. Also, keep your video drivers up-to-date, and keep other open applications to a minimum.