The Struggle for Broadband!

Had kind of a busy day today. Working on a Saturday is not one of my favorites. Phineas seems to really get a bang out of it but I sure don't! Went to brother Bill's place to get the cat5 cable in place that will carry the high speed internet connection on back to his office. He is really wanting to get CAD going in his drafting business and broadband is almost a necessity to be able to do it right. Since DSL is not available for him, he had to go with the local cable company. This option started out on a bad note. Originally, Comcast wanted over 1000.00 to get the cable (large "hardline" feeder cable) back his rather lenghty 600 foot lane. I managed to talk a Comcast engineer into running the more standard cable halfway back his lane. I offered to take it from there. It will mean putting the cable modem, and 110v. receptacle, in an enclosure about halfway down his lane. From there we plan to run a cat5 cable, in conduit, the rest of the 300 feet. This will allow us to make it into his garage where we will install the router and connect the 4 PC's located in the office above the garage. All this may seem like a lot of hassle but I feel it will be worth it in the end. The thing that really makes me frustrated is the whole DSL issue or lack thereof! I have to pay 58.00/month for my broadband through Comcast simply because there are no other cheaper options. If Verizon would just get their act together and get DSL more available around here it would save a lot of trouble and money etc. Everytime I see an advertisement for Verizon DSL it makes me want to scream! That Ad seems to be everywhere loudly proclaiming their DSL service for only 15.00/month. That is an incredibly cheap price for broadband to be sure but what good is it if hardly anyone can get it? I just can't believe its almost the year 2006 and DSL service is so sparce. I will keep you posted on how things work out at bro. Bill's place.