The Five Most Important Things to Know to Make Your DSL Run Better

After years in the field working on DSL I have found that my DSL customers have made a lot of very basic mistakes that make their DSL not work as good as it should. I have boiled them down to five very easy things that most DSL users need to know.

1 You have to know how DSL works. DSL is a high frequency signal that is put on top of your phone line. It 's just like when you go on a ski trip and put that thingy on top of your car to hold your ski's. Once you do this, your car now becomes a people transporter and a ski transporter. The same thing happens to your phone line when you buy DSL from your phone company. They add DSL to your phone line and your line can now carry phone conversations and your internet data at the same time. That's why you can talk on your phone and be on line at the same time.

2 The Filter stuff: The DSL signal that makes your DSL modem work loves to go only to your DSL modem. It hates to go to all the other wiring and equipment that you have connected to your phone line over the years. This is why in the box with your modem, the modem company included filters to connect to your phone equipment. The filters remove the DSL signal from the device you plug into them. This filter stops the DSL signal from going to places it should not, like your phone, fax machine, old dial up modem you have in your computer, the old phone you have in your garage or basement that you never use but still have plugged into a phone jack, or every satellite cable box you have plugged into your phone line, they all need to be filtered also. It's always a good idea when installing DSL to take some time to think about all the stuff you have connected to your phone line and where it plugs into a jack. If you are doing the installation yourself you are going to have to get a filter installed on all your existing phone equipment.
The most important rule is next. It will always be true and is the number one thing that you must know when you set up your DSL.

3 The Rule: Everything that plugs into your phone line that is not your DSL modem MUST have a DSL filter. Your DSL modem must never be plugged into a filter. This is the number one thing that makes DSL work poorly (or not at all) that people do wrong. They either under filter their phone equipment, by not installing a filter on every device that connects to the line (that is not the DSL modem of course). Or they do the opposite by installing a DSL filter on the DSL modem, thus removing the signal from the modem that the DSL modem needs to work. Now here is where things can get a little confusing,
Lets say you live in a house with only one phone jack and you want to plug in the DSL modem and your phone at the same time. You have one of two ways to do this:
1. Connect the wire from the phone jack to the modem and (on modems that provide a phone connection) you can now connect your phone to the modem. In this setup the DSL Modem has a DSL filter built in to it. So the modem will act as your phone filter and away you go.
2. On modems that do not provide a place to plug your phone in, the phone company will provide you a with a special filter with two jacks in it, one will be labeled "DSL" the other "phone". To use this device, plug your DSL modem into the jack labeled "DSL" and plug your device that uses the dial tone into the other jack labeled "PHONE". I say "other device" because you can plug anything that uses your phone line like a caller ID box, fax machine, satellite cable TV box, or any other device that uses your phone line to work.

4 The burglar alarm and DSL: They hate it. Alarm systems really mess up the DSL signal and (for you to get you DSL to work correctly) you must filter out the burglar alarm. This is not easy and usually takes a call to the phone company or your burglar alarm company to set up your alarm system to work with your DSL modem. The problem occurs because the phone line actually goes through your alarm. This is done (on the vast majority of professionally installed burglar alarms) so that in an emergency situation the alarm system has the first connection to the phone line, and will be able to connect to the alarm monitoring company even if you have a phone off the hook or are trying to send a 100 page fax and a fire breaks out (on systems that monitor for fire) the alarm can always get dial tone to call out on to send for help. The problem is most burglar alarms were never designed to pass the DSL signal, so they can really mess up your DSL.
Also remember: If you have an old alarm system installed that you may not even use, chances are your phone line is still wired through the alarm and is messing up your DSL signal. You must correct this condition to get your DSL to work the best it can.

5 The best way you can get to make DSL to work is to "home run" the jack the modem is plugged into and filter at the network interface. As we have discovered in the first four tips, the DSL signal is very picky and needs to go only to your DSL modem and does not like to go to all the other equipment and wiring in your house. The best way to accomplish this is to install a special home run DSL filter at the network interface. If you are wondering, the network interface is the official spot on your premises where "you" officially begin and your phone company "officially" ends. It is here where you can have installed a special filter that will filter all the equipment in your house and you can then have run a non-filtered (home run) wire to your DSL modem. When you set up your DSL in this manner you bypass all the problems you may encounter in most DSL installations and you have the added advantage of not having to filter all your phones and other phone equipment because they are filtered in your network interface. The only problem is that this can usually only be done by a telecom technician and they will probably bill you to to configure your DSL in this manner. You should only take this step if you have already tried to install your DSL and your are certain you have done it correctly and it still does not work or works poorly . To save time and a lot of frustration if you have a complex installation that has a lot of phone equipment and wiring, such as most small to medium size businesses it is usually best just to have a technician install the home run wiring and filter when the DSL modem is installed.

Now for certain the above five tips can't cover all the crazy stuff I have found and fixed in my career as a DSL technician, The five steps do cover the easy stuff that most people do wrong and can easily fix on their own. One last bit of advice: If you do all the trouble shooting stuff above and still are unable to get your DSL to work and have to call to have someone to come out, make certain you are home when they show up. This is the only way that you will be able to give the technician access to your property to properly test and repair your DSL. Also it is the the only way you can verify after they complete the repair that the DSL is actually working before they leave. That is very important, make certain you can surf the internet with your DSL modem before you let the technician leave. Then and only then will you know that your DSL is working properly.