Literature on Internet

At 10:52 AM -0700 4/3/08, John Ferman wrote:
>We are planning on subscribing to some sort of broadband service,
>which I suppose is 'always on.' I guess this exposes us to
>interlopers, so I would like to read up and get smart on firewalls. I
>also suspect our internal 56k modem will be useless, so another
>reading subject is on connectivity and hardware stuff, like high speed
>modems. Anyone know of any especially illuminating reading pieces,
>such as books. Thanks.

        For the vast majority of available broadband services, you have no
option as to what hardware you use to connect to the system - the service
provider lends, rents, or gives you the device (cable modem, dsl modem,
satellite modem, whatever). Back in the day, I bought my cable modem from
the cable company since it was cheaper in the long term than renting it
(and then managed to sell it on eBay a few years later when we moved for
almost full price), but I do not think that is an option in most situations.

        I think that most of these broadband systems are now using
"standard" equipment, so it should be possible to use commodity hardware,
but in practice I do not think that many do and even if they did, the price
savings are not significant - the typical $5 per month rental is not so
high that savings would be significant if you purchased your own equipment.

        With that said, you should find out the options from the broadband
providers that are available to you, and factor in any required equipment
rental fees to your price comparisons.

        And whenever someone is changing ISP/email address, I recommend
they should take the opportunity to move to an email address that they
control rather than get tied to one ISP's email address. Purchasing your
own domain and using it to point to your ISP provided email box allows you
to transparently switch ISP or email hosting service at some time in the
future.

--
* Johann Beda - contact link: <http://xri.net/=j-beda> *
* Johann's MostlyMac Computer Consulting - <http://mmcc.beda.ca/> *

I just switched from dial-up to cable a few weeks ago.

At that time I also finally networked our 2 Macs, so that required a router (4-port, c. $40) and Cat. 5 ethernet cabling (between each Mac and the router). The router provides a firewall. My brother-in-law also has cable and with only 1 computer doesn't use a router, using the Mac's built-in firewall instead.

My router set itself up automatically, but I've had experience in networking (even took a course!), so you might want to familiarize yourself with the terminology and what's going. You could probably find enough at About.com:

http://compnetworking.about.com/od/basicnetworkingconcepts/Networking_Basics_Key_Concepts_in_Computer_Networking.htm/

If you use a router, have it in place and working when the cable is installed, since it can affect the setup. The cable company may want to charge you extra, however, if more than 1 computer is connected.

The cable company (Comcast) put in their own cable modem, including the ethernet cable between the modem and the router. (It goes into the "WAN" port, and the Macs connect to the "LAN" ports.)

I have since bought my own cable modem (cheap on e-Bay). Comcast has a page listing compatible models. Switching it required calling Comcast with the new modem's MAC address.