I'm talking about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_service. With streaming stackoverflow podcasts and downloading the lastest updates to ubuntu, I would like to have QoS working so I can use stackoverflow without my http connections timing out or taking forever.
I'm using an iConnect 624 ADSL modem which has QoS built-in but I can't seem to get it to work. Is it even possible to control the downstream (ie. from ISP to your modem)?
I don't know if this will help you, but I've never been a fan of using the ISP provided box directly. Personally I use a Linksys wrt54gl, with DD-wrt, behind(DMZ) my ISP provided box.
DD-wrt has excellent QoS management.
Sorry I can't be more help with your existing hardware.
You should ask your ISP if they actually support QoS, but I very much doubt that it'll be enabled on your DSL connection.
You just need the tc command to handle the QoS on Linux boxen. However I wouldn't expect that much from it because of the results I obtained and detailed here.