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Grex > Coop7 > #121: ISDN Internet Connection | |
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| Author |
Message |
| 25 new of 51 responses total. |
steve
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response 25 of 51:
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Dec 8 22:20 UTC 1995 |
Unforunately, you can't determine what a "local community" is by
looking at an IP address. You'd have to come up with a mapping scheme
that has a database of "local" Internet addresses, which changes hourly,
so that won't work.
We can, and always have limited the number of users on Grex. First
we had five dialin lines, becuase that was what we thought we could
afford. Then we got the Internet connection, and we used the number
of pty's (48) that came with the system. We could go higher, right now.
The number of people we allow on the system has always been at least
a little arbitrary. Once we get an ISDN line, if we kept the number of
incoming people to 48 (maybe 56?), we'll be able to let those people do
something once they're on. If we ramp up the number to some large
amount like 96, we'll be right back where we are now, albeit with more
people running party at once.
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ajax
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response 26 of 51:
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Dec 8 23:09 UTC 1995 |
I assume you mean 48 or 56 ptys on the Sun 4, not the Sun 3...CPU speed
is arguably a more limiting factor than Internet speed for many activities.
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lilmo
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response 27 of 51:
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Dec 9 06:01 UTC 1995 |
How much faster IS the ISDN than our 28.8k (sorry for the "dummy" question)?
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scg
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response 28 of 51:
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Dec 9 06:40 UTC 1995 |
ISDN goes in 64K channels, which the phone company sells in pairs, but which
Internet providers feed individually. What Grex is looking for is two channel
ISDN, which is 128Kbps. The quote I got from one local Internet provider for
that (for the company I work for; not for Grex) was $200 per 64K of bandwidth,
meaning $400 for 128K. If this is going to be possible for Grex, we need to
be able to get the price down to a lot less than that. I should mention that
there appears to be a catch to this 128K figure, in that the phone company
charges somewhere in the area of 10 cents a minute to do an ISDN data call,
even if it's local, while ISDN voice calls are unmetered. There are rumored
to be ways of getting around the charge while still dialing as a data call,
but nobody I could get through to at Ameritech, or the Internet provider I
talked to, was sure about what those are. It is, however, possible to dial
an ISDN call as a voice call, and then send data through it. This now seems
to be the recommended way to keep an ISDN Internet connection up 24 hours a
day. The catch to this is that speed is limited to 56K per channel, or 112K
for the two channel setup that Grex is looking for.
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carson
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response 29 of 51:
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Dec 9 09:10 UTC 1995 |
That price you quoted, it's per month and not one-time, correct? ;)
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srw
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response 30 of 51:
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Dec 9 17:33 UTC 1995 |
That's correct. These are monthly prices. The price is high because there is
a high cost associated with getting packets switched onto the internet. We
are definitely hoping to see that come down, but we are also looking for a
provider who sees us not as a source of profit, but of community good will.
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adbarr
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response 31 of 51:
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Dec 9 17:38 UTC 1995 |
We are not negotiating with the right peoplel This may take an end run. We
need to be a bit more creative.
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sidhe
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response 32 of 51:
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Dec 10 00:06 UTC 1995 |
Oh, well.. I had said, "if possible", and I guess the quotes are
inaccessable.
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mdw
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response 33 of 51:
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Dec 10 07:17 UTC 1995 |
One of the things I find most fascinating about grex is the # of people
from more than 50 miles away. We do already give local users another
option, in the form of direct dial-ups, so we are already providing a
certain amount of favoritism.
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lilmo
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response 34 of 51:
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Dec 11 06:48 UTC 1995 |
Huh? Where did that come from?
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mdw
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response 35 of 51:
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Dec 12 08:21 UTC 1995 |
(See #24)
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sidhe
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response 36 of 51:
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Dec 16 13:34 UTC 1995 |
A good point, marcus- if you live in Ann Arbor, you have a premium
way to link up with Grex, and the way the rest of us have to do it.
Nothing terribly wrong with this, but the provided local slant is
not deniable.
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steve
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response 37 of 51:
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Dec 16 17:07 UTC 1995 |
I don't think we can avoid something of a slant towards local
users. The important thing, I think, is to keep things even
whenever possible.
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raven
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response 38 of 51:
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Jan 22 19:11 UTC 1996 |
Is Grex still thinking about ISDN? I think it would be a very good
move in conjunction with the Sun 4 as it would speed up Grex's internet
access, both inbound and outbound quite a bit. Note this is *not* a personal
interest thing for me, I use local dial in, and have an ISP for net surfing.
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kaplan
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response 39 of 51:
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Jan 23 01:34 UTC 1996 |
I don't think ISDN is a very strong possibility soon. We'd need more money
than we've been taking in lately for the monthly costs, and the cost of
bringing an ISDN line into the Dungeon is high enough that we probably won't
want to pay it before we're sure that we'll be in the Dungeon for reasonably
long time.
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srw
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response 40 of 51:
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Jan 23 08:02 UTC 1996 |
At this point there are no foreseeable plans to leave the dungeon. The problem
is money. The quotes we got were higher than we hoped, but there are still
leads being followed. (One ISP is installing new service, so we're waiting
to see what they come up with.)
The biggest problem is that the number of users is declining. We haven't
collected enough to pay for our expenses recently. I personally hope we can
turn that situation around with more reliable hardware, which really is around
the corner. I am not ready to give up on ISDN yet.
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scg
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response 41 of 51:
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Jan 23 08:32 UTC 1996 |
Right, we're losing money right now. If people want ISDN, no, if people want
Grex at all, people need to contribute more.
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popcorn
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response 42 of 51:
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Jan 23 09:43 UTC 1996 |
I'm still planning to do some organizing of the ISDN quotes we got and see
if we can manage something. Better connectivity might well bring in more
paying members.
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scott
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response 43 of 51:
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Jan 23 12:06 UTC 1996 |
srw, do mean the number of "members" is declining? I think we're seeing an
increase in non-paying users, but a decrease in paying members.
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steve
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response 44 of 51:
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Jan 23 13:27 UTC 1996 |
Scott's right.
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kerouac
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response 45 of 51:
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Jan 24 01:00 UTC 1996 |
I thought grex's landlady *hated* grex, and was convinced by the FBI
that grex is the ultimate evil in the world...
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popcorn
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response 46 of 51:
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Jan 24 03:06 UTC 1996 |
Er, um, no. Well not exactly.
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carson
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response 47 of 51:
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Jan 24 03:08 UTC 1996 |
Makes for better tabloid reading, though. ;)
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adbarr
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response 48 of 51:
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Jan 24 21:23 UTC 1996 |
FBI? Thought it was the SS?
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kerouac
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response 49 of 51:
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Jan 25 03:28 UTC 1996 |
Wasnt grex's landlady resolved to evict grex even if it meant selling
her house? Well maybe the board paid her off or something....
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