DSL Gotcha

[Michael Hipp]

Kurt Wall wrote:

> Hey, list,
> 
> I learned something interesting about DSL today. I was having lots
> or intermittency problems with my DSL connection. A call to tech
> support later, and it was fixed. Immediately. The solution: make
> the RJ11 cable from the wall jack to the modem as short as possible.
> The Ethernet cable can be as long as the protocol supports, but the
> RJ11 cable needs to be very short, or the connection will be unstable.

I've never seen that problem, but it is no doubt due to the RJ11 cable 
being untwisted. The uniform twisting of cat5 and even good old 
telephone house wire gives it an inherent ability to reject noise. Has 
to do with how the e-m fields cut through both conductors identically.

And it's a good "trick" to remember for the future.

Michael