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Dan Albrich
dalbrich@oregon.uoregon.edu
Eugene cable modem users lost service on December 1 when the Internet provider
@Home stopped its service due to financial problems.
Some users may have hardly noticed the brief outage because AT&T created
a backup network to provide service. The big problem is that all of the former
@Home users had to change email addresses and may have lost prior emails stored
on the @Home system.
While AT&T hasn't raised the price of cable Internet service, it has reduced
the speed of downloads to less than one quarter their former maximum. Cable
users in Eugene can expect to get no more than 1.5Mbps for downloads and no
more than 128Kbps for uploads.
What about DSL? Comparably priced DSL service includes 640Kbps for downloads
and 256Kbps for uploads. The uploads are faster with DSL, but the downloads
are limited to less than half that of cable. Since most home users are most
concerned with download speed, cable Internet service is still quite reasonable.
Unfortunately, the rocky road for cable Internet users isn't over yet. On December
20th, AT&T announced a merger with Comcast to form a new company called
"AT&T Comcast." The new company may or may not change services
and prices for cable modem users. This type of change can reduce the quality
of the service, raise prices, or both. We'll hope for the best until the facts
are known.
Occasional DNS Problems with UO Systems. Cable modem service in Eugene
has not been perfect. A minority of users have suffered a major problem with
Domain Name System (DNS) registration both under @Home and AT&T's new management.
(DNS is a table of names that map to IP addresses. Its converse, "reverse
DNS," maps IP addresses to names. For example, DNS tells Internet users
that darkwing.uoregon.edu is at 128.223.142.13, while reverse DNS would let
someone curious about the name of 128.223.142.13 find out that it points at
darkwing.uoregon.edu.)
Internet providers are obligated to provide DNS registration for basic Internet
connectivity. In a number of cases, cable modem users lacked either forward
or reverse DNS entries--effectively disabling their connections to our timesharing
hosts Gladstone, Darkwing, and Oregon, all of which require correct DNS registration.
(We require proper DNS registration for incoming connections because computers
that have incorrect registration are often used intentionally by spammers or
hackers to try to conceal their identity.)
In the past, users affected by this DNS problem have had great difficulty reaching
either @Home or AT&T to get the problem resolved. @Home had a policy against
users running any server software in their home over the cable modem connection.
The new AT&T network takes that a step further by blocking certain inbound
connections. For example, AT&T currently blocks all inbound port 80 connections
so it is not possible to run a web server on the standard port from home. This
isn't a change in policy, but a change in the level of enforcement. (For more
details regarding AT&T's Internet acceptable use policy, see their information
page at http://help.broadband.att.com/faq.jsp?content_id=1107&category_id=34&lobid=1
)
At the moment, Microcomputer Services is unaware of anyone encountering DNS
problems, but past experience requires us to mention them for your consideration.
If you're a current cable modem user and are happy with the service, you may want to stick with it. Cable modem users pay month-to-month without a contract, whereas all current DSL promotions require a one-year agreement. On the other hand, if you're considering a new cable modem purchase you might want to wait until the effects of the Comcast merger are known.