J wrote:

>I am not as technically minded as many of you seem to be so please
>excuse me if I ask some dumb questions.

It's dumb to ask. It's dumb to assume.

>Struggling to understand this POTS connection situation. Can anyone
>explain in simple language.

Plain Old Telephone System - your regular phone line.

>My son can no longer use this connection for his games. I can no longer
>use the connection for Iphone, Netmeeting and files do not transfer over
>icq.

Most of these can be fixed I think. It's a matter of telling the modem what
to allow through. Someone knows how to do this and I'm sure they will respond
with the details.

>Adsl's main attraction for me in the first instance was the speed and
>the fact that you could be online continuously without being kicked and
>only needed to use dial-up when the adsl server was down and because of
>the flat rate charge you could relax and enjoy the net without
>constantly checking to see what you were being billed.

Yep. Those are the appealing features to most people I think.

>Now as I see it you can no longer leave your computer on continuously as
>every minute costs, and the software that we use, not being commercial,
>can no longer be used so what is my advantage of staying with adsl.

Well, if you aren't receiving/transmitting anything, leaving the computer on
shouldn't matter.

>Having read all the emails I now find that although I will suffer
>withdrawal symptoms for the speed Ihug and Saturn, now to me, appear
>very attractive and for the amount they charge flat rate per month even
>the occasional kicking would not hurt too much.

I won't go back to a modem. I'm far too selfish and have become accustomed
to the speed.

But I will swap from ADSL to a cable modem if the price is better. I already
have Saturn here and I'm just waiting to see what the cable modem offer is.
 I've heard good things about it, but most rumour from people who know people
at Saturn.
Dan LangilleThe FreeBSD Diary - http://www.freebsddiary.com/freebsd
The Racing System - http://www.racingsystem.com/racingsystem.htm
NZ FreeBSD User Group - http://www.nzfug.nz.freebsd.org

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Received on Mon May 3 10:46:49 1999