[handyman]

Sorry my post may have come across as a bit sarcastic but I have worked for technical support for ntl which has modems that support usb and ethernet and also for freeserve/wanadoo which has modems that only support usb.

In my opinion based on years of supporting these modems and years of actually usings them the costs involved in using ethernet are negligable compared to the stability and ease that it presents.

On ethernet if you change your computer you can simply unplug the cable modem for a few seconds whilst you pop in the ethernet cable to the new pc. 10 seconds later the modem has sensed the new mac address (of the ethernet card) and assigns your ip to the computer.

Usb on the other hand brings with it:-

modem driver issues
chipset driver issues
power management issues
conflicts
os incompatibilty with drivers
and worst of all you cannot add a router switch or hub to create a network.

So to summerise :

usb = not good
ethernet = very good
ebuyer = many many ÃƒÆ’Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ãƒâ€šÃ‚Â£ÃƒÆ ’‚£ spent no problems