DSL For Your Business

Cape.Com is pleased to offer DSL services to business and residential customers throughout Massachusetts. Pair our Business DSL with our Broadband Voice service, and your business has a high-speed ticket to BIG savings! Business class DSL speeds are available up to 3.0M down/768K up.

Special Offer!
Order Business Class DSL and we'll waive the activation fees - an $85 savings! Plus, the modem is now just $49 outright or FREE* if you are an existing Cape.Com customer!

DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) is a modem technology which converts your twisted-pair telephone line into a high-speed connection to the Internet. It's 'always on' and does not interfere with your existing voice grade phone and fax service. Talk, fax and surf all at the same time!

Qualify for DSL now!

A Class of Our Own

When it comes to DSL offerings, we're in a class of our own. There simply is no better DSL provider more in tune with your business needs than Cape.Com.

No term contracts: Sign up and cancel your Cape.Com DSL when you wish.

Static & Public IPs: Static IPs (as opposed to continually changing dynamic IPs) come standard at no additional charge with all Cape.Com Business DSL plans. SOHO plans and higher offer Public Static IPs, so important for business use. Higher business DSL plans include multiple Public and Private Static IPs!

Committed Information Rate (CIR): the minimum data transfer rate you may encounter under your DSL plan. Cape.Com guarantees a specific CIR speed with certain plans.

LAN/WAN Use: Cape.Com can configure DSL to work on both local area networks and wide area networks. Save money using the same connection!

Sales tax and port fees are included: in the monthly rate -- not added to your bill as hidden charges like other providers do.

Backup Access included: 150 hours of backup dialup access accompanies every DSL plan.

Free Spam and Virus filters plus Cape WiFi Hotspots available to all Cape.Com accounts.

Free, fast, friendly, proactive Technical Support: for connection-related problems on workstations covered under your DSL plan with Cape.Com.

DSL vs. Cable

DSL is a direct dedicated connection to the Internet, unlike cable, which is a shared access. A cable internet connection can be shared by up to 500 subscribers, and is vulnerable to capacity overload problems, outside security intrusions as well as outages. In addition, cable speeds are often unreliable, and slowed considerably by many siumultaneous users.

DSL provides your own personal high-speed connection via telephone line which is not compromised by multiple users sharing the same equipment. Plus, DSL allows for greater privacy when transferring data and keeps your computer much more secure. And have you noticed that when cable and electrical outages occur, your phone line still operates? - it has to, telephone service is mandated by law.

Read what businesses are saying about Cape.Com DSL service.

DSL Business Plans and Pricing

Cape.Com provides several DSL service levels as outlined in the chart below. Business class DSL speeds are available up to 3.0M down/768K up.

All Cape.Com DSL accounts include an email account, 150 hours of backup dialup access per month ($1/hr for every hour over 150), a 10 MB Basic FTP/website, and technical support . Additional backup connections, web hosting, email services, and e-commerce solutions can be added to a DSL account as needed. See the Related Links below.

Service	Target Use	Public Static IPs	Private Static IPs	Speed Down/Up	CIR	24x7 Monitor	Band Width Stats	CPE Hot Spare	Monthly Price
Workstation	home office	0	1	3.0M/768*	no	no	no	no	$49
DSL-SOHO	small business	1	3	3.0M/768*	no	no	no	no	$84
DSL-Corporate	mid to large business	5	16	3.0M/768*	200/200	YES	YES	YES	$160

Unlike other providers, Cape.Com's pricing includes sales tax and port fees. Pricing is subject to change without notice. Contact Cape.Com for additional connectivity options for medium to large sized businesses that require greater speed and/or support beyond our DSL plans outlined above. Cape.Com also offers competitively-priced Fractional and Full T1 lines for businesses.

* Speeds of up to 3.0M/768K. However, not all locations/lines will qualify. These lines will be provisioned with fastest speed available

Public IP: A workstation or server with a public IP is accessible by machines on the broader Internet. Any server, eg. mail or web, that you would like to access from remote locations would require a public IP. All Cape.Com public IPs are static IPs.

Private IP: A workstation or server with a private IP cannot be seen from the broader Internet. Cape.Com offers a number of private IPs with each business DSL plan. Upstream Cape.Com routers use a technique know as NAT (Network Address Translation) to convert PrivateIP traffic into a corresponding Public IP. NAT is used to conserve precious public IP's. It has the added advantage that workstations in a private IP space are much more secure from external intrusion or attacks. All Cape.Com private IPs are static IPs.

Please note: Additional private IP's can be allocated to a DSL-Workstation plan at a cost of $5/month. Should you wish to swap Private IPs for Public IPs on your DSL-SOHO account or above, there is a cost of $10/mo. for each IP swapped, with a maximum of 4 IP's swapped.

Additional services provided for DSL Corporate Plan

CIR: Committed Information Rate is the amount of bandwidth that Cape.Com guarantees will always be available for your use. All DSL connections are able to burst to the maximum available bandwidth when available, typically 3.0M. The CIR is the minimum guaranteed bandwidth that you should expect.

24x7 Monitor: Once every 10 minutes your connection to the Internet is tested to verify that it's properly working. If a failure is detected, a Cape.Com system operator is immediately notified and corrective action is taken.

BandWidth stats: Real time bandwidth consumption on your line is automatically collected and made available to you via a password-protected web site. The website provides you with a graphical representation of bandwidth consumption on a daily, weekly and monthly basis.

CPE Hot Spare: Customer Premises Equipment Hot Spare. Cape.Com maintains spares of all DSL equipment that it deploys at the customer's site. If a failure occurs with your DSL equipment, Cape.Com will provide a working unit while your equipment is sent back to the manufacturer for replacement or repair.

Access via a 'red phone' to Cape.Com technical personnel from 8 am to 10 pm, 7 days per week. If you call this number during non-business hours, a Cape.Com system administrator will be notified via beeper and return your call.

How We Do It

Cape.Com strives to provide a broad range of Internet services and superior levels of support and technical expertise. We are the only locally-owned, full-service Internet company in eastern Massachusetts offering DSL at this time. Our carefully planned deployment of a high-speed regional network has kept our DSL offerings intact, while many other companies have come and gone. See what sets Cape.Com apart from Verizon and other DSL providers.

Cape.Com provides a number of DSL services for businesses. Choosing the best service will depend on the number of computers at your office, and your speed and IP address requirements. We also offer DSL/Web Hosting packages for qualified businesses. The Cape.Com DSL team will assist you in choosing the plan that's right for your needs.

We encourage you to read the requirements and current restrictions involved with DSL. To review the most frequently asked DSL questions, see our DSL FAQs section.

Share your Cape.Com DSL experiences with others at DSLReports.com. Click below to email a review:

To qualify for DSL service, customers must meet a number of telephone-company mandated requirements, and be within a 3.5 mile radius (18,000 ft.) of their telephone company central office or remote terminal. Please review the reasons why DSL may not be available at your location. If these reasons do not presently pertain to your situation or you are unsure, please please complete the DSL Qualification form to verify whether service is available on your line. Preliminary results will be available online after inputing your information. We will confirm these results in a separate email. If DSL is not currently available, we will get back to you with other high-speed alternatives. If you don't qualify for DSL service now, don't despair, it's likely that you will qualify in the near future.

Technical Support for DSL Plans

Cape.Com will happily provide DSL technical support, however, support is limited to email and DSL/Internet connection-related problems. Cape.Com will support IP issues only to the extent that the IP in question was assigned by Cape.Com, in accordance with the DSL plan currently in place with the customer. Connection issues relating to routers will be supported on all DSL plans that require a router to be in use. However, support for router issues for DSL-workstation and DSL-SOHO plans are not supported by Cape.Com, as these plans do not require a router, but rather a modem to be in use. Cape.Com will support DSL on the number of workstations specified on the DSL plan, but will not support workstations beyond this number.

Detailed technical support beyond the above parameters and including network, hardware or unrelated software issues is charged at the rate of $100/hr., whether provided via telephone, email or on-site/in-person. A Cape.Com representative can visit your location and install the hardware and software for DSL service. The charge is $100/hour (1 hr min.) including travel time, and generally takes approximately 2 hours to install DSL on a network.

Should you have questions about the level of support for your DSL plan, please contact Cape.Com for clarification.

DSL Network Requirements

For businesses that choose DSL, a DSL router/modem must be installed at your location and connected to the DSL telephone line and your internal network. Before ordering DSL service, be sure that your internal network is 10 BaseT Ethernet and that you have a spare 10 BaseT Ethernet port on your network hub.

Depending on the DSL plan that you choose, Cape.Com will provide your company with IP addresses, private or a mixture of public and private, for your internal servers/workstations. A workstation or server with a private IP cannot be seen from the broader Internet, however, it can access all sites on the Internet. Upstream Cape.Com routers use a technique known as NAT (Network Address Translation) to convert Private IP traffic into a corresponding Public IP. NAT is used to conserve precious public IP numbers, and has the added benefit of assisting in securing your computers from external intrusion or attack. Note: Network Address Translation is not a firewall solution. Workstations or servers that must be accessible from outside of your internal network will require public IP addresses.

Installation Charges

1. A one-time nonrefundable startup fee of $60 is required when placing an order. If this is a new Cape.Com account, a $25 account activation fee would also apply. These fees are waived through April 1, 2007.
   
   
2. Cape.Com sells the following DSL modems:
   • CastleNet AR502 SOHOSpeed or AS502 ($105/ea. plus tax). Special through April 1, 2005: $49+ tax or free to existing Cape.Com customers.

   The CastleNet AR series is a good choice for smaller networks (up to 8 workstations), and is ideal for home office use. This device offers many of the features that the Cisco 827 does, but at a significantly lower cost. This device, however, does not scale up quite as well as the more advanced Cisco router.

   For DSL Corporate: A Westell Wirespeed bridge modem may be used if your network already has a router, or if you plan on installing a firewall device. If you don't have a router already, the CastleNet AR series modems (as described above) may be used.

   DSL modems and routers can also be purchased elsewhere, however, before purchasing a DSL router, please contact us to confirm that it is compatible with Cape.Com's DSL network. Should you have any questions about routers, please contact Cape.Com's Network Provisioning Department prior to placing an order, or email netprov@cape.com with your questions.
   
   

3. A Cape.Com representative can visit your office and install the hardware and software for DSL service. The charge is $100/hour (1 hr min.) including travel time, and generally takes approximately 2 hours to install DSL on a network. A technician from our Network Provisioning Department will contact you to discuss the details of the installation. There may be certain LAN-specific variables and internal telephone wiring issues that Cape.Com will not be able to address, however, Cape.Com will assist you in determining your exact needs and suggest an installation path that will provide minimal disruption to your existing office LAN/WAN.

   Should you choose to install the hardware and software yourself, an installation document will be shipped out when you place your order for DSL service.
   
   

4. Please note that a $60 Order Change fee will be charged to an account should the customer request the DSL be provisioned or moved to a different telephone number AFTER the order has been placed. A $60 Cancel Request fee is assessed if DSL service is ordered during a fee waiver promotion period and then cancelled within 1 year of the date of the order.

DSL Order and Installation Information

1. Please complete the DSL Qualification form to verify whether DSL service can be provisioned on the line. We'll run a 'loop qualification' to verify whether DSL service is available.

   Here are a number of reasons why DSL would NOT be available:

   • It's too far from the Telephone Company Central Office.
   • It's being serviced by a 'remote switch' or vault.
   • It's not all copper from location to Central Office
   • ISDN, Foreign Exchange (FX), Direct Inward Dial/Direct Outward Dial(DID/DOD), service on line.
   • Line is resold by a different phone company, and not billed to Verizon, e.g. CTC or RCN.
   • DSL already on the line
   • First number in a Centrex hunt
   • Dial tone at more than one location on the line
   • Toll-free number
   • Digital interference on line
   • Central Office temporarily not accepting DSL orders due to capacity
   • New phone line not yet installed (loop-qualification generally requires an active phone line)
   
   
2. If DSL service is available on the phone line, place your order for DSL service with Cape.Com. All order, provisioning, and trouble resolution issues are handled by Cape.Com; there's no need to contact the phone company. DSL service should be turned up within 10-15 business days from the day the order is placed.
   
   
3. Within 5-7 days of your order, Cape.Com will send you a DSL installation kit. Included with this kit are the following:
   • One in-line telephone filter. A filter must be connected to all voice-grade devices (phones and faxes) which are on the line that will receive the DSL service. Should you need additional filters, you can purchase them from Cape.Com, Best Buy, Radio Shack, etc. When DSL is turned on, a high-frequency tone will be heard on any phone line that does not have this filter.
   • A DSL modem or router if it's been ordered from Cape.Com.
   • Installation instructions providing a detailed description of the hardware and software installation.
   
   
4. When the DSL service has been turned up, Cape.Com will notify you that it's available. If you've ordered an installation service from us or one of our affiliated consultants, we'll schedule a convenient time to visit your home or office to install the service.

Dedicated Connection Comparison Chart

The following chart provides a quick comparison of the various types of Business class Internet connections that Cape.Com provides. If DSL is not available at your location at this time, this chart offers alternative access solutions. For businesses with multiple offices, the connection to each office may be different, depending on the location of the office and the level of service required. For a detailed analysis of your connectivity needs, contact Cape.Com to schedule a meeting.

Service	Availability*	Speeds	Target Use	Comparative Advantage	Distance or Other Restrictions**	Monthly Bandwidth Costs
Dedicated Dialup, Multilink PPP***	Area 1 and Nationwide Dial-up areas	33.6K to 150K	Intermittent connection from home, office, or on the road	Low cost	none	$60/mo. for one workstation/server
ISDN	Area 1	128K	Intermittent connection from the office	faster than dialup	3.5 miles	Starting at $23/mo., not including telephone company charges
DSL	Area 2	up to 3.0M/768K	low cost 24x7 office connection	always on, low cost	3.5 miles, line quality	Starting at $49/mo. for residential, $84/mo. for up to 3.0M/768K speed
56K Frame Relay	Area 2	56K	mission critical office connection	always on, high reliability	none	Starting at $125/mo., not including telephone company charges
T1	Area 2	384K to 1.5M	high speed, mission critical connectivity	high speed, high reliability	none	Starting at $550/mo.

* Availability Codes:

• Area1 All of Massachusetts and New Hampshire.
• Area2 Eastern Massachusetts, the areas included in all area codes except 413.

** Distance Restrictions:

• The mileage figures are maximum distances from your location to the Telephone Company Central Office. Contact Cape.Com to request a "loop qualification" to see if ISDN or DSL is available.

*** MultilinkPPP:

• This technique allows you to dial into our network using multiple modems and phone lines and combine these lines into a single, higher speed connection to the Internet. For instance, if you were to connect with three V.90 modems and each modem was able to make a 50K connection, then your effective download speed would be 150K.

Leased Line vs. DSL Comparison

When looking at the various options available for dedicated connectivity to your office, the decision frequently comes down to a digital leased line vs DSL.

A digital leased line includes 56K Frame Relay or T1 connection. Each of these leased line options have different speeds and price points. As a technology group, though, they're quite similar in that they are proven, mature, and reliable. DSL, by comparison, is a promising and exciting broadband technology.

The following items should be considered when deciding on the most appropriate technology.

Price

For a given amount of bandwidth, a DSL connection will be cheaper than a leased line connection. DSL is appropriate for small or medium sized offices that need 24x7 connectivity to the Internet. Leased line connections are more reliable and appropriate where higher speed is required or where the applications are mission critical.

DSL pricing ranges from $49 to $160 per month and includes includes sales tax and port fees.

A 56K Frame Relay will start at $125/mo., and does not include telephone company charges. T1 connections start at a flat $550/mo. (with no additional telephone company charges.)

Speed

ADSL is asymmetrical, providing a higher download than upload speed. Download speeds can be up to 3.0M and uploads can be up to 768K. Speeds are dependant on phone line quality and distance from the CO. Leased line digital connections are symmetrical. A full T1 provides 1.5M bit in each direction. There are no distance constraints with these connections.

Availability

DSL circuits have a distance limitation and are only available if you are within approximately 3.5 miles (18,000 feet) from the telephone company Central office or remote terminal. Contact Cape.Com to see if your office 'loop qualifies' for DSL service. Leased lines are available anywhere.

Reliability

Time to Repair, and other quality issues, on leased lines are specified by State and FCC regulations. AT&T has a very good history on quickly resolving any problems with leased line circuits. DSL is given the same priority by Verizon as voice grade circuits. Whereas response time for a failed leased line will be less than 5 hours, response time for a DSL line failure may be up to 72 hours. If your connection to the Internet is mission critical, a leased line is the preferred solution.

Get Qualified for DSL today!

Just complete the DSL Qualification form to verify whether service is available on your line. Preliminary results will be available online. If DSL is not available, we'll provide alternative high-speed options in a separate email.

* Fee waivers ($60 DSL setup and $25 Cape.Com April 1, 2007. To be eligible for the free use of the modem, new DSL service must be an upgrade from a lesser connection service, and be billed to an existing account in good standing and established for atleast 30 days, else the charge is $49 outright. Loaner modem must be returned to Cape.Com in good working order when DSL service is terminated (minimum of one year service required, else $60 early termination fee applies), or user will be billed the modem's full retail price ($105) . Massachusetts 5% sales tax applies to all modems leaving the premises of Cape.Com, whether they are paid for or part of a free promotion (based on the $49 price). The $60 DSL speed change fee waiver applies to existing DSL customers who qualify for a higher rate of speed, and who commit to atleast one-year of DSL service from Cape.Com.

Related Pages

Related Links

Printer Friendly Version (Will Open In New Window)