DSL is definetly faster then dial up. Dial up connects to the phone line as well and then your line stays busy and people who call you cannot get ahold of you. A dial-up internet connection works very similar to phone lines. If there is a bad connection, your Internet usage will suffer. Also generally Surfing the Internet will be rather slow with downloads never reaching a high speed. DSL, on the other hand, is dedicated Internet connection device. This typically allows it to achieve speeds up to 35 times faster than a dial-up modem.