Naked DSL finally unleashed: Broadband stripped to its core

With the mobile phone all but established as everyone's default telephone, it's reasonable for people to question whether or not a fixed landline is needed at all. Upon realisation, of course, that no phone line has traditionally equalled no Internet connection, it not hard to feel backed into a corner. The solution? Two words: naked broadband, or, to use its street name, naked DSL.

What is naked DSL (or naked ADSL)?

Far from a new phenomenon, naked DSL has been around for quite a while - since 1999, actually. However, telecom industry disputes have prevented the medium's widespread release, until now. There's nothing sordid in the name; naked DSL simply refers to broadband without a phone service - all you need is a telephone connection. So, in other words you do need a telephone line, but you don't need a calling service provided by one of the telecom companies, e.g. Telstra, Optus, etc.

The elimination of a phone service as an obligatory part of your Internet package can save you $20, $30 or even more with some Internet service providers (ISPs), so needless to say it's a fairly significant development, freeing people from a costly phone service that they may not need (although, technically freedom has been available for a while for those willing to opt for a comparatively sluggish mobile broadband service).

So how exactly does this work, when we've always been led to believe that a phone service is mandatory for fixed broadband? This is where it gets a bit more technical - time to don the thinking cap.

How naked DSL works

While naked DSL sounds like a great development, it isn't for everyone. For starters it isn't necessarily even available to everyone (more on that later though). Naked DSL can only be provided by ISPs with their own Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer (quite the mouthful) or "DSLAM". [A quick definition needed here: a DSLAM is essentially a device at the Internet exchange or telephone company office that gathers many DSL signals from customers and combines them into a larger "backbone", which facilitates the fastest speed - DSL - over long-distance interconnections. In other words, a DSLAM gathers up lots of customer DSL lines, combines them together and links them to the exchange, or "node", where the telephone connection is sourced.]

What this ultimately means is that not all ISP's will necessarily be able to offer naked DSL. In fact, only iiNet provides ADSL2+ broadband in general nationwide and many ISP's have announced, but not delivered, naked DSL to date. It's getting better though; to begin with no ISPs were able to launch naked DSL due to cost issues and telecom infrastructure wrangles.

Naked broadband: Telecom disputes

Rather tellingly, one small quirk behind the naked DSL story is that it could have revolutionised broadband several years ago but for a telecom conflict. Given Telstra's largest market share in telecommunications, and the fact that the company has always gained a huge chunk of its revenue from fixed land line services, it effectively had the power to block the Australian release of naked DSL. Until the competition regulator decided to intervene, Telstra was able to set the wholesale price of the country's copper infrastructure (most of which it owns) too high to make offering of naked DSL services workable for ISPs. Following a forced decrease of Telstra's access prices, however, naked DSL has become an entirely more viable service, and in the final quarter of 2007 and first quarter of 2008 several ISPs were able to either release, or execute firm plans for, naked DSL, with iiNet and Engin being two of the first. Internode actually went one further by launching its naked DSL service using Optus DSLAMs instead of Telstra's, completing the demotion of the latter's market hold (in this particular niche only, of course) .

Naked DSL: A buyer's guide

Naked DSL isn't available everywhere unfortunately, being very much ISP and geography-specific. Check with your chosen provider whether or not you will be eligible for the service. What's good to know is that some ISPs, such as Internode, offer their services on a "no success, no fee" basis, which means that you can feel completely confident finding out.

Naked DSL is generally more expensive than standard broadband (due to an ISP's increased infrastructure costs) - you won't save the full phone service fee - but you'll not only save at least some decent money but also escape being contractually tied to something that you don't need, don't want and have no desire to worry about. Rather than removing the phone service entirely, some providers offer an alternative phone service. For example, iiNet naked DSL offers a broadband phone service (dubbed "iiTalk") with all local and national calls included as part of the deal.

Beware though, some ISPs charge download fees and line activation fees - you may decide that the phone service costs weren't so bad after all. As with everything, find out what's available first and then choose what suits you best from the options (once you've weighed up the costs).

It's hard to say what will be the next big, widely-adopted thing in Internet service delivery - fibre optics, for example, with its huge capacity for speed has had a fair measure of success in Paris, but is yet to become remotely near worldwide standard. In the meantime, if you don't require a home phone line but want a service matching the speed of fixed broadband, naked DSL could fulfil the bare necessities.