Upstream is not a problem if you're on optimum online from cablevision.  I got 10 mbps downstream, 1.5 mbps out.  I can send one megabyte in 20 seconds.  Phenomenal.  Hopefully in 5 years the telephone companies will be buried, and that's payback for decades of robbing everyone without ridiculous fees.  Voice over IP with a cable modem will mature soon.

Good luck with your upstream, I just got lucky with the cable modem rollout. 

And, previously, I had both infoSpeed DSL and a DirecPC.  Cable beats them all hands down... at least optimum online.

C.
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Dale Botkin 
  To: PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU 
  Sent: Saturday, May 20, 2000 4:32 PM
  Subject: Re: An idea for faster upstream rates[OT]


  On Sat, 20 May 2000, Andrew Seddon wrote:

  > I just came up with an idea and wanted some opinions on it. Basically I was
  > just reading an article about the emerging internet bandwidth technologies
  > and every single one of them had a much faster downstream than upstream
  > rate. Some of them with 40:1 ratios. This is bad if you wish to run
  > e-commerce servers on site etc... So here`s my plan to sort this out.
  >
  > The ISP would continually transmit numbers 1 through 16, when the client
  > received the number it wanted to send it would reply.
  >
  > Now thinking about this quickly it could definitely speed up the upstream,
  > but like I said it just occurred to me so feel free to pick holes.

  The reason ISPs are so intensely interested in asymmetrical connections
  such as ADSL is to keep people from running e-commerce servers, porno web
  servers, pirate software ftp sites, and other bandwidth hogs.  They're
  selling retail, end-user access to the Internet, which means lots of
  downstream speed and very little upsteam.  If you need lots of upstream
  speed, you're probably not the customer they're after.

  Of course, you CAN get lots of upstream speed too...  but you pay for
  commercial service.  This is problematic for the little guy, of course,
  and there is a point below which it's simply not cost effective to pay for
  commercial service, so you put up with limited upstream bandwidth.  I know
  my cable modem goes like a bat out of hell downstream, but upstream is
  throttled to 128Kbps.

  Dale
  ---
  The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new
  discoveries, is not "Eureka!" (I found it!) but "That's funny ..."
                  -- Isaac Asimov