For those of us who experienced the painful slowness of dial-up access (you could actually stand up and make yourself a cup of coffee before the webpage fully loads on your browser), broadband will feel like a godsend. The difference is like taking the freeway compared to having to drive through downtown Main Street, everything moves fast because the road is wider and there are no stop lights.

Broadband is the common term we use today for this new and zippy access to the Web. It usually means you have a bandwidth (how wide the road is) of 768Kbps (Kilo bits per second or thousands of bits per second) or higher. In fact, if you subscribe to a broadband service today, your choices now a days would most certainly be in the Mbps (Mega bits per second or Millions of bits per second). Broadband services can come several service providers like your telephone company, your cable company or from your cell phone company. In some parts of the world, it can even come from the Electric or Power company.

So, you may be one of those who are still undecided whether to get on the broadband bandwagon or not. To help you out, let's make a list of compelling reasons and their possible downsides, if any.

Cost. If you're a dial-up user, you probably have a second phone line at home, because using your dial-up service will tie up your telephone line and keep it busy. However, with a DSL broadband service from the telephone company, you wouldn't need to maintain a second phone line because the nature of DSL technology allows voice and data to share one line. Of course, a broadband subscription is more expensive than a dial-up subscription, so this might actually just even out.

Speed. Just as we mentioned above, broadband is definitely faster relative to your dial-up access. Dial-up speed can max out at 56Kbps while broadband speed can reach well over 10x that. The only speed limit for broadband would probably be based on your budget.

Access. What you might not know about broadband is that you are ALWAYS ON. This means, no more dialing every time you want to get connected to the Internet. However, with the Always-On status of your connection, you open yourself up to the possibilities of hackers and attacks and probably more than double your chances of getting a virus, so keep this in mind and make sure your system has the necessary counter-measures installed, like a good firewall and anti-virus software.

Applications. The Web today offers so many forms of entertainment that are out of reach for dial-up users. Broadband's speed makes all these new features of today's Web enjoyable, as opposed to frustrating, because the waiting time is almost negligible. Features like audio and video streaming, TV over IP, animation, VoIP and Gaming. Of course, some of these applications may require a faster computer to better enjoy them.

Server. Broadband would now allow you to be a host of your very own webpage instead of just being a visitor on other people's pages. Setup a web server on your computer and register a domain and you've got yourself your very own web site. It may not be ideal for E-commerce but you can certainly put up a personal webpage for you and your family for the entire web to see.

If these five reasons are not compelling enough for you to go broadband, other than the fact that there is none offered in your area, then you may not be ready for broadband yet. The Web will however continue to evolve and pretty soon, you might not have a choice.