Often too many people get confused with all the definitions, here we have explained in easy to understand terms.

ADSL:
Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line - asymmetric meaning it`s faster downstream than upstream.

ASAM:
Advanced Services Access Manager -Whether you have a DSLAM or ASAM in your exchange doesn`t really matter. They do the same thing. See DSLAM`s as well.

ATM:
Asynchronous Transfer Mode - a method of encapsulation which is capable of many virtual circuits. With these, providers (ISP`s) can split an ATM connection (155Mbit or 622Mbit) up into many connections. ATM isn`t just used for DDSL but in the case of DSL it`s used to provision each customer.

Contention Ratios:
A contention ratio is the number of users to xMbit of bandwidth. For example some providers offer 2Mbit DSL, with a ratio of 50:1, meaning 50 users to 1Mbit of bandwidth.

CPE:
Customer Premises Equipment, the term that describes the equipment used on the customer end of a connection, for example your DSL modem/router or cable modem.

DSL:
Digital Subscriber Line.

DSLAM:
Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer ? They are placed in DSL enabled Telecomm exchanges, when your modem syncs up and the DSL light comes on, it means you are connected. When data travels down your connection, it goes from the CPE -> DSLAM -> RAN -> ISP

ERX:
Edge Routing Exchange. See RAN.

IPNet:
Telecommunications backhaul networks for carrying traffic from the customer to the ISP, i.e. carrying traffic from RAN`s to ISP`s.

Ping or Latency:
A ping measures the time in milliseconds that it takes for a packet to travel from your computer to a remote computer and back to you again. Just because you can`t ping a given host, quite a lot of providers are beginning to filter ICMP (pings come under this protocol) traffic because it is commonly used to attack hosts and wastes a lot of bandwidth. Many providers also give low priority to ping (ICMP) traffic which may mean your p