Finally I found the right forum for this question!
Well - the rumour is that a tecnician from my ISP said that the adsl-connections they offer actually is set to twice as much bandwith than the agreement (256/256 = 512/512). The limit should lie within the Cisco 677-router that is delivered and preconfigured with the connection. It should be possible to reconfigure the router to get the "real" speed. It IS legal to configure the router as you like, but if you f*** up, it cost you ~100$/hr to get it fixed.
Does any of you know how to check if it's right and maybe know how to configure this?
I know this question may sound a bit lame and naive - nevertheless I think it's worth to check it out.