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I just set-up an old handme-down system for my computer-illiterate mother.


To try out the internet, she decided to just go with a basic dial-up ISP connection....

The phone lines in my town are so crappy, we only get 26.4 hookups citywide....




B R U T A L is the only way to describe surfing at her house...




With all that added CRAP that hotmail sends, it'll take 5 minutes just to GET into my hotmail inbox....


(Can I get an "awwwww poor squatpuke" from anyone?)


Seriously, how many have dialup...what speeds do you connect at...and do we need to pray for you?

I have dial-up. I've never had anything better, so I I'm used to it, won't become enraged and pose a danger to myself and others, so I probably don't need prayer, but I have often wondered if getting a lot more done in a lot less time wouldn't be a wonderful thing as the time I can spend sitting shrinks to less and less.

Is 56k a dial-up speed? If so, I think that's what I have going...except when I'm trying to download. Then it drops to way less.

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Yo...consider dialup as your local ice-cream truck and broadband as the USS Enterprise running at Warp 9 with brand-spankin' new Dilithium crystals....


Yeah, I pay about $48/month for DSL....but it's well worth it considering the $20 bucks I'd have to pony-up for simple dial-up and the associated headaches.


I had dial-up for YEARS....probably 13+...I'd never go back no matter what the cost; probably sell the kids or donate an organ, or whatever it took...

I believe you! Who would not believe you?????
The problem is that I don't have anything like 48 bucks to spend. When I didn't get the 15 buck price for dial-up I was expecting, I had to ask my cousin to drop it entirely. When he tried they gave me one more month free, but when that's over, I'll have to go back to being a guest on my cousin's account, and that's going to put me in a huge bind in terms of my internet job.
As my second-in-command annouced to my roles players, our game will continue, but at impulse power.
It's going to be a great deal harder for me to run and play in. :(

I wub my dial-up. :P

Right now it's running at 115.2 Kbps. Most times it runs at 26.4 and 34.6. If I'm really lucky, 40.0.

You poor poor man, oh how I feel for you. I don't mess wit dial up nuthin no more, cept the odd system that comes through the door needin repair, then I jerk out the modem an stick it on my network right quick for whatever it needs etc. Although, my lappy is runnin off a wireless air net card that varies greatly in speeds, low as dial-up, high as cable from time to time an it gits very frustratin as all git out le'me tell ya.

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Dude...no forum on the planet would safe if you had broadband....

I know. It's something I need to work on....

How to justify broadband (not sure if this applies to those outside the US or not...):

What is your monthly Long Distance bill? Do you have an all-in-one plan? How much do you pay in LD?
Add to that how much you pay for your ISP. What's the total up to now?

I was using NetZero as an ISP. I longed to build webpages for folks, but with only 10 hours of free internet every month I was seriously bandwidth-challenged. Not to mention that the 10 hours would only connect about 30kbps.

We were on AT&T Long Distance one-rate or something like that. Our entire phone bill, no matter how much time we were on long distance, was $72/mo.

Well, we started getting these letters from AT&T about VOIP - Voice Over Internet Protocol. I started crunching numbers.

6 months of RoadRunner @ $29.99 per month intro charge.
6 months of CallVantage @ $21.99 per month intro charge.
That's six months at $51.98 per month. No fees or taxes! :booyah:

After six months, we downgraded RoadRunner to "RoadRunner Lite" which runs at 384kbps, $24.99 per month. Still enough bandwidth to get our phone (which is now $29.99 per month) and decent speed internet. I haven't yet calculated my speed while on the phone. I need to do that.

Our monthly cost for telephone and high-speed internet is $55.00 per month. It's unlimited long distance and decent bandwidth internet. Can't run a high-hit server on it :( and there are times that the cable goes out :urgh: . But overall, I'm happy. I don't complain 'cuz I was finally able to

Justify High-Speed Internet!

Our dial-up is $120/year.

We pay 30 per month for the slower cable internet( includes modem cost for the first year), but it is fast enough that I don't have to wait for things to download like I did on dial up. We use cell phones with unlimited LD and talk time --those are 30 per month-hubby works for US cellular--

before we were paying 22 for dial up, and 36 for land line phone, and 8-10 for cell phone..

I've been paying 15 for dial-up and nothing for my disabled rate phone (which is about 10 bucks monthy) because my elderly uncle insists on paying it.
My uncle has turned 90, so I assume I'll be paying my own phone bill all too soon :( , but sharing dail-up with my cousin will cost me $7, although much of my pleasure in being on the internet will be gone.
I will have have that extra ten hours a month free Juno internet time, though. :rollseyes:

I cut back to the nerdly level cable package hoping that will help, but I can't bear to stop it entirely, because I get zero Tv reception without it.

I pay $28 for my QWest DSL line @ 1.2 mbs up/800 mbs down...
I pay another $17.50 for my ISP....


So I pay a total of $45.50/month just for my Internet....add another $50/month for our phone and $30/month for wifey's cell....

OUCH....

Clay, sounds like you have a good deal going....

As paranoid as my wife is about spending any money, I have to justify everything before I buy it. This one REALLY went in my favor!

'Course, with accursed SBC acquiring AT&T, I think my good thing may have ended. :(

Well, there's always Vonage...

To keep broadband, we must keep VOIP.

Oh - and $100/year on pre-paid cellular.

We have dial up too. Right now I am running a whopping 46667bps. Catch my dust. :rolf:

We had Verizon DSL for about 6 months once. It was an introductory thing and after the six months were over we were presented with a $129 bill. So that ended that.

I don't mind our dial up as a rule, but I was thoroughly depressed yesterday when my son wanted to watch a videa at nickjr.com and they said "you got dial up? Aren't you just the cutest thing. GET OUT."

Welcome E-beth.
I have dial up too. I wasn't missing anything until I hooked up the universitys network.
<highest pitch voice you can muster> fast.