[TriLUG] broadband in the Triangle area

[mpdickens at tlanta.com]

I do not live in the N.C. area. However, DHCP is always your
friend when doing a broadband or DSL installation. FWIW, I've had
no problem here in Georgia using DSL or broadband. I've got
my girlfriend setup with Bellsouth.net DSL (She is also running
Linux). Here at home, I use Atlantabroad (Broadband, just as the
name implies). Also, I did a Linux setup for a friend and he is on
COMCAST broadband.

In all instances, the DHCP portion of the installation boot process
reconized the existance of the ethernet card as well as the DSL or cable
modem. I run Gentoo and Mandrake at home. I've got my girlfriend setup
with Mandrake and my friend is running SuSe. I've played around with
Debian in the past. The ethernet sniffer in the Debian setup is rock solid
as well as the DHCP client stuff: I really don't think your gonna have a 
problem.
Debian is noted for stability and the project members pride themselves in
everything working.

Just be sure you have a *well supported* ethernet card in your machine.
Don't go with the Sam's Choice of ethernet cards or you could end up with
no joy when you run the ethernet card sniffer or manually insert (Using mod
probe) the ethernet driver. Read the Howto section regarding ethernet card
and broadband setup (Two different documents). Go with the hardware that
the docs say work. However, I'd stay away from the USB to DSL/Cable modem
setup and stick with ethernet. It's tried, true and stable.

I do a lot (And I mean a lot) of network equipment repairs (Chip level 
and such)
on hubs, routers, switches and blades made by Cisco, Lucent, IBM, 3COM, 
Fore
(Just to name a few). Not a day goes by that I don't have to change 
network cards
or the network configuration (You name the configuration and we run 
it...) in at
least one of the systems that we use to trouble shoot / repair equipment 
with. All
of this equipment is running Linux and we never have driver problems or 
networking
issues. Before we left windows and went to Linux, I could not say this.


Best regards


Marvin Dickens
Alpharetta, Georgia.