Webuser Forums: Broadband Puzzles !

I have found this forum by rummaging around the internet for help on Broadband for Newpersons. The set up here seems quite complicated to me and I don't know where to go for advice, as any phone or internet provider will have a vested interest in their answers to my questions, so I am hoping that someone will be kind enough to read through this and provide some impartial answers.

Broadband is coming here in a few weeks when BT upgrade the local exchange. This is a home based office using Macs.

We have two separate phone lines coming in: one is for the house so I can do "friends and family" on that bill, and my computer's dial up uses that line, so my ISP's modem is my best friend number and I get 20% off all my dialling up.

The other Mac's dial up uses the office line. So we get two BT bills per month.

Plus, we have a deal with Cable and Wireless (used to be Mercury) whereby, if we dial memory+recall+9, the phone dials the 14-digit pin into the C&W network, then you dial the no. you want. So we also get a monthly bill from C&W. (Phone calls routed over their network are reckoned to be cheaper than straight through BT though I must admit I haven't inspected this for ages.)

Our ISP is a Mac specialist one (who already host our domain and email service) so I'd be inclined to continue with them for Broadband connection, plus their deal appears to compare very favourably to BT (no minimum fixed contract and cheaper per month).

So, the bits I don't get are: which bill would the ISP's broadband (£20+ pm) replace? I guess it would be the C&W one, which we would stop using? Secondly, would we need two broadband modems - one Mac using house line, the other for the office line? People keep talking about routers too. I think they mean you can connect more than one computer to a single broadband connection using a router.

The start-up and hardware costs are not slight: £50 connection fee; USB ADSL modem £36.99 each - or do I need only one of those plus one Ethernet router with multiple ports for existing LAN £73.99; (we have an Ethernet hub at the moment which connects the two Macs and the network printer); 2 static IP addresses £4.99 pcm each (I don't even know that this is, but it's on their equipment list). What is an ADSL microfilter?

I am getting bogged down with information over-load here! Thanks in advance.

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