Broadband Internet, help meeeeeeeeeeee Options

[Murray]

I was sitting in my physics lesson and we started talkin about fibre obtics, and then about broadband internet. Mr Campbell (thats my techers name, he looks like dean cain, the guy from the new adventures of superman) said that broadband internet uses fibre optics and total internal reflection. He then said that the cable shud be kept as straight as possible to get the best performance.

When the man form NTL came to fit the cable, he gave us shitloads of the stuff and now it runs all over the floor and cos its quite rigid, its got bends in it, not tight ones, just loose u-bends.

I was wonderin does this affect the performance of my internet cos wen i went to get my e-mails, it said connection timed out. Now i no i havent got a T1 or even 512k modem, but i was expecting to at least get my e-mails, i cud do that on a 56k in about 10 secs max.

Its gettin quite annoyin tho, cos i was takin the piss outa my mate for havin the slowest modem in the world, and then he comes round my house and we cant get on to web pages  

But my pings ok wen i play cs?? Hmmmmm curiouser and curiouser

well if u can help me thanx, but i gotta go and get a suit now for my prom

ta raa

[james]

Well what I mean is I think the fiber-optic part of the cable system is ony up to the junction box which services your node (the contended bit of the network which you share with any houses that are connected via NTL cable in your immediate vicinity) - as I understand it the bit to your house and from the NTL box which it goes to in your house and up to your computer/router are on copper cable - in which case the teachers comments about keeping the fibre-optic cable straight are not relevant in terms of the cable the NTL muppet left all over your house