Nope my above statement isnt in correct, read it again.
Cable = DSL = ASDL = Phone
CABLE - runs over fibre optic cables through the ground - similar to DSL but not 100% the same - broadband is delivered via the same method as cable television
now just for the spotters here are the full discriptions of the copper wire broadband
DSL - digital subscribers line - runs via BT's exchange and runs through bt's old copper wire phone lines
DSL (
Digital Subscriber Line) - a technology for bringing high-bandwidth information to homes and small businesses over ordinary copper telephone lines. Assuming your home or small business is close enough to a telephone company central office that offers DSL service, you may be able to receive data at rates up to 6.1 megabits (millions of bits) per second (of a theoretical 8.448 megabits per second), enabling continuous transmission of motion video, audio, and even 3-D effects. More typically, individual connections will provide from 1.544 Mbps to 512 Kbps downstream and about 128 Kbps upstream. A DSL line can carry both data and voice signals and the data part of the line is continuously connected. DSL competes with the cable modem and satellite transmission for high-bandwidth information reception.
ADSL - Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line - adsl is a form of DSL but not the same and runs again through BT's phone exchange via old copper wires
ADSL (
Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line - the form of DSL most familiar to home and small business users. ADSL is called "asymmetric" because most of its two-way or duplex bandwidth is devoted to the downstream direction, sending data to the user. Only a small portion of bandwidth is available for upstream or user-interaction messages. However, most Internet and especially graphics- or multi-media intensive Web data need lots of downstream bandwidth, but user requests and responses are small and require little upstream bandwidth.
DSLAM (Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer) - a device that interconnects multiple DSL users to a high-speed backbone network. Typically, the DSLAM connects to an asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) network that can aggregate data transmission at gigabit data rates. At the other end of each transmission, a DSLAM demultiplexes the signals and forwards them to appropriate individual DSL connections.
cable is able to deliver faster more stable speeds due to the fact its delivered via fibre optic cables it doesnt really matter how far away from the exchange you are unlike bt where the further from the exchage you live the slower and less reliable the connection becomes.
as for dsl connections there are about 10 different types, SDSL HDSL etc etc etc all offer different functions and upload / download speeds or bandwith priorities.