Although things keep changing, today, and probably for the next few years High Speed Internet for the home means a connection speed of between 1 and 1.5 mega-bits/second .
If you are now using a "dial-up" Internet connection, high speed Internet will be about 10 to 20 times as fast. A good example of the speed of a connection is the National Weather Service's Doppler Weather site which you can view by clicking here. On my high speed connection the site will load all the pictures and start producing a moving picture in about 5 to 6 seconds. Try this with your connection to find out if you are missing anything.
High speed Internet is quite addicting as you begin to find that very slow Internet sites you never had the patience for before become available, and it is fairly cheap.
This depends on where you live as there is a technical limit to the most common type of High Speed connection known as DSL. DSL means "Digital Subscriber Line" and is limited to an 18000 foot wire distance from the telephone companies C/O/ (central office). If you live in the actual towns of Bieber or Adin (not too far out) you are within the 18000 foot limit and DSL is available through Frontier Communications, your local telephone company. I am informed that as of today there is enough equipment installed to supply new customers in the Adin and Bieber area with DSL.
If you live farther than the 18000 foot limit (remember telephone lines don't go straight) there are two other possibilities, the radio (or wireless) service offered by High Desert Online and a satellite service offered by Direcway
DSL, jargon for "digital subscriber line" uses your existing telephone line to ALSO supply an Internet connection. Although it uses the telephone line (wires) it does not tie up your telephone like dial-up. It is always on, meaning your computer is always connected (so long as the computer is turned on). Your normal voice telephone is not affected, it works like a telephone, even while you are on line.
The "plain old telephone system" (POTS) was designed almost 100 years ago and as a voice service it works extremely well. It was never designed to supply digital service such as Internet, but thanks to modern wizardry digital services can be supplied, but not always. There are wire distance limitations (about 18000 ft. or about 3 miles) wire quality limitations, but in general if you live in the town area of Bieber or Adin, there should be no problems. Nubieber even has DSL available, but no guarantees.
In my opinion, DSL is the preferred way to get connected to the
Internet. I just moved here from the heart of Silicon Valley and
I now have better and more trouble free internet connection through
Frontier than I had back in Santa Cruz. Since Frontier supplies
the telephone line, the DSL connection to the Internet and the actual
internet access, you deal with one company instead of 3 separate
companies who always blamed the other when something went wrong.
At least for me, Frontier has offered excellent rapid and reliable
service. Their DSL equipment is even generator backed up during a
power outage and I can be online using battery operated computers
during a failure.
Frontier is now the only provider of DSL in the Big Valley
Area. Their phone number is 1-800-921-8101. Their
current offer is $29.95 per month with no setup charge and free
equipment.
If you have Direct TV satellite television just go to channel 227 to hear how wonderful it is! What they don't tell you is:
If you have no other choice, satellite interconnections do work and are probably reliable. They are however expensive and not nearly as fast as their ad claims.
High Desert Online does offer wireless internet service and has antennas mounted on the Bieber Water Tower. I know very little about this service and they do not even mention it on their website. If and when I get more information I will post it. All I know is the it works and you have to but about $300 worth of equipment to start service. I believe it has about 1 Mb/sec (2/3 that of DSL in this area) speed, but that is shared amongst many customers.