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We asked students from Syracuse University's School of Information Studies to gather some data on DSL availability outside major metropolitan markets.

We weren't looking at small, rural towns; rather, all the cities surveyed had populations of 50,000 to 100,000. What we found may or may not surprise you, depending on whether you've tried to provision a branch office with DSL lately.

This data was gathered earlier this year from two sites, DSL-reports.com (www.dslreports.com) and Telco Exchange (www.telcoexchange.com), that are not affiliated with specific carriers.

DSLreports.com, which is based in New York, is a small site that claims to have a unique view of how the DSL industry is meeting consumer and small-business expectations. Launched as a private effort in 1999, it is written entirely in ModPERL, and the site's pages are created on the fly in response to user input using Apache Web servers and SQL databases running on Linux. Besides the capability to search for DSL availability by ZIP code, the site offers in-depth technical information on a range of broadband issues.

Telco Exchange, of Fairfax, Va., is positioning itself as a telecom portal, with an eye to the B2B and B2C arenas and the corporate market. It aims to provide pricing and ordering information to commercial users seeking high-bandwidth communications services from major carriers and ISPs; its focus is not exclusively DSL.

We found the DSL coverage offered by many carriers in these smaller markets somewhat spotty. Examples of what we came up with can be found here.

To find out whether DSL is available in a given area, check the online resources we've mentioned here, and contact not only the major carriers that serve the area but also smaller providers, which may offer better service.