Rating home broadband Broadband will change everything. Those connections now reach more than 5 million US homes with cable modems, digital subscriber lines and, to a smaller but growing extent, wireless and satellite systems. If any part of the country is ready to test the hype that liberation from the tedium of dialing up to the Net will radically change how we connect to our neighbors and to the world, Greater Boston may be the place. Verizon Communications claims that nearly 60 percent of the state's 4.4 million phone lines can now support DSL access, slower per dollar than cable modems but still up to 12 times faster than a standard modem, with the always-connected feature. And between the two giants, RCN Communications and dozens of smaller service providers are bringing the power of broadband to hundreds of thousands of homes around the area.
Video conference calls.
Software and computer games you can download and rent instead of buying. And beyond some of the new formats that are still emerging, an Internet that presents itself nearly instantaneously can become a far bigger, more helpful part of your life. I'm constantly on the Internet, and it's all right there. She also uses RoadRunner for online banking and grocery shopping. She still finds her machine breaks down periodically, but less often, and not enough to make her question the move.