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Vintage Computers Any vintage computer systems, calculators, video games etc., but with an emphasis on 1980s and earlier equipment.

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Old 31st Aug 2020, 6:13 pm   #21
Hartley118
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

Our company was an early internet adopter. ISTR we had a Compuserve account - back in that day, internet access seemed to carry brand names. In the 1990s I travelled a lot and, wherever I was in the world, I still needed to dial an expensive London number to get my email and internet access.

Our first home account was with Peter Dawe’s Pipex - the first ever UK ISP. It was actually branded PipexDial! We then graduated to Dixons Freeserve. Each provider offered some website storage, so I would design a simple website. However, I’ve long since lost access to those ancient home made web pages. I guess they’re still sitting lonely and unvisited on a server somewhere!

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Old 31st Aug 2020, 6:29 pm   #22
Junk Box Nick
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

I was king of the hill in the 1990s – I had an ISDN connection.

The line rental was seriously expensive. I only thought about this the other day when on the other internet thread there was comment about removal of phone lines – there are still three to this house.
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Old 31st Aug 2020, 7:44 pm   #23
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

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Originally Posted by electronicskip View Post
Looks like this lot still offer a dialup service in uk. Nippy Internet.
Doubtlessly the irony is lost on them...
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Old 31st Aug 2020, 8:34 pm   #24
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

I just dialled it and got a recorded message, "The service is closed".
Also their website is not SSL encrypted, a relic of the past.

Anyone know of a working dial-up number for old-time sake?

What would I need to create my own, using my broadband as the back-haul, I have a collection of dial-up modems and VoIP gateway devices.
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Old 31st Aug 2020, 9:05 pm   #25
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

You can do it reasonably easily, though it's a bit pointless. You just need a modem connected to a computer that can manage a PPP connection and bridge it to the internet. To be any practical use you would need multiple incoming phone lines and modems though.
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Old 31st Aug 2020, 10:54 pm   #26
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

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Originally Posted by MrBungle View Post
We still had EDI dialups at work until 2018. Now there’s software that emulates them over IP using virtual serial ports.
Was that modem to modem though? That's still do-able, at the peak of the dial-up era it was specialised carrier-grade head-ends (Southnet had USR x2 ones) and those are the things it's impossible to get spares for.

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Perhaps some of the last users were shops for the card terminals. Instant now, but at one time it could take quite a while to connect.
It wasn't unusual to see EFTPOS machines on dial-up here until Spark turned off the old Telecom X25 Pacnet network. I think that was supposed to be 2017, but had clients as late as last year still on it - they've all switched to IP-connected though.

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I was king of the hill in the 1990s – I had an ISDN connection. The line rental was seriously expensive. I only thought about this the other day when on the other internet thread there was comment about removal of phone lines – there are still three to this house.
The two business I managed from 1999 to 2003 and 2003 to 2010 had ISDN - it was only twice the price of a normal business line at the time, and you got two "lines" with it. I only used it for internet in the first one until we got ADSL in 2002. Being a business service we had to pay local call charges, but some places were cheeky and set up themselves as a Centrex ISDN extension from the ISP - you had to pay for both ends, but you ended up with an always-on 128kbps connection for the price of two ISDN rentals - $240 a month - and a Centrex fee which from memory wasn't too bad. That was a lot of speed in the late 90s.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 12:30 pm   #27
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

I cant believe i used to play video games on the Dreamcast and Gamecube via a dialup connection modem built into both consoles although there were broadband versions available for both systems .
Used to work quite well as i recall.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 3:19 pm   #28
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

Programs were much smaller then, and expectations realistic. The complexity of the modern GUI adds considerably to the overheads.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 4:24 pm   #29
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Some of the more advanced 16 bit and PC games like flight simulators used to offer varying degrees of 2-machine connection so that either two players could play on the same side / mission or oppose each other in a dogfight. Connection between two machines was ideally(!) via a null-modem cable but often the use of actual modems was supported as well. This probably worked better in the USA where dialled calls to local numbers were free, unlike in the UK.

When networking became a bit more mainstream, this gave rise to the 'LAN party' where individuals would pick up their entire PC and all required paraphernalia and take it to a building, someone's big house or a hall hired for the night and play multiplayer networked games.

Going back to the beginnings on dial up, there was something quite magical about looking out of the cockpit of your F-16 (or whatever) and knowing that the other aircraft flying beside you was being flown by a real human being. I could never shake the rising feeling of panic over the likely final cost of the call, though.

Same problem with using pre-internet dial-up bulletin boards, very much the forerunner of this type of forum we're using now - you always had to be aware of how long you had been connected especially if the BBS wasn't in the UK.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 5:09 pm   #30
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

I used to run a bulletin board via a Sinclair 48k and a prism VTX5000 Modem back in the day, my mum used to go mad when she wanted to use the phone and the Board was live with people posting as i seem to remember.
I think the transmit speed was about 1200 baud?
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 6:01 pm   #31
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

I had the same problem / conflict, although more for when I wanted to dial out to somewhere. I ended up getting my own second line put in (at my own expense of course) as soon as I could afford it.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 6:53 pm   #32
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

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Originally Posted by arjoll View Post
The two business I managed from 1999 to 2003 and 2003 to 2010 had ISDN - it was only twice the price of a normal business line at the time, and you got two "lines" with it. I only used it for internet in the first one until we got ADSL in 2002. Being a business service we had to pay local call charges, but some places were cheeky and set up themselves as a Centrex ISDN extension from the ISP - you had to pay for both ends, but you ended up with an always-on 128kbps connection for the price of two ISDN rentals - $240 a month - and a Centrex fee which from memory wasn't too bad. That was a lot of speed in the late 90s.
Yes, I can remember the two phone numbers that came with the system. I was doing a lot of regular contract work at the time. By no means everyone I worked with had ISDN - they were sending Syquests, magneto-optical disks or Iomega Zip disks to various service providers – but a couple of my regulars who had 'names you have heard of' blue-chip clients did. However, for various reasons the nature of my work had changed and with the computer making some once essential plant redundant, working from home became a possibility. This also meant I was not too far away from aged parents where problems were brewing.

Before you paid for the line installation and overheads, ISDN cards and their software packages were hideously expensive - several times the price of the desktop machine required to run it. BT charged a premium for line rentals plus call charges on top - I remember some hefty bills. Then a German firm got into the market with, though still expensive, a considerably cheaper product and I figured it might just be viable and give me an 'edge'. I had the idea that rather than going into clients' premises, and having to hot desk, or if there was a full complement of staff in having to try to work using some ancient abused machine with minimal memory that had been relegated to menial tasks (I was still expected to do the work just as quickly, of course), that if I could receive files over ISDN I could work on my own machine with all the advantages of having my apps and machine set up the way I liked it, and I wouldn't be occupying a client's machine when someone in-house might need it. No driving – I could receive work files in less time than the drive. A win-win situation surely?

Actually, no. I forgot about the mindset that generally applied: if you weren't physically there you were probably hanging out washing, feeding the cat or working on another client's job or, more to the point, someone couldn't simply walk in with a 'can you just' or some vital bit of the brief they'd forgotten – they would have to phone you up.

Fast-forward 20-odd years and one pandemic later and everyone's WFH!

Given the overheads I doubt the ISDN system ever paid for itself. It did have use providing a bureau service to local clients to send files to far flung places – and I was still providing this service by the early to mid-2000s.

By the time clients had accepted the idea of remote working reasonable capacity broadband had come about.

Last edited by Junk Box Nick; 1st Sep 2020 at 6:58 pm.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 8:00 pm   #33
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

The 'second line' problem (whether for a dialup modem or for a fax) was addressed in some areas where there was limited cable-capacity by BT supplying a "DACS" which worked as a sort of 'line-splitter' to give two analog POTS ports over a single pair.
Unfortunately, because of the way these worked, trying to use a dialup modem or fax over one was an entirely unsatisfactory experience - which sort-of defeated the whole object of the thing in the first place.

I had to get quite a few early WFH-types to arrange a _proper_ second-circuit rather than a DACSed one.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 9:17 pm   #34
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

That happened to me, initially my new line was a DACsed one added to the physical line my parents already had, because historically the builders of the estate had only laid in one copper pair to each house (all underground).

I complained and I think they pulled a second cable in through all the ducting from the street cabinet. Then it worked OK.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 10:25 pm   #35
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

One of the issues, that I experienced for a while, was that if you were online via a modem, and 'someone' decided to ring their mum it would drop your connection. There was a device often known as a fax switch. I managed to obtain one without a power supply from a site closing down sale (along with some far more interseting Marconi test gear) and got it sorted. When we moved here 20 years ago, I had some extra wiring installed (BT 6 pair) to take the phone line up to the office to this switch before distributing back to the house phone lines. These days I use (until I replace it with proper cable) those twisted pairs to carry ethernet from the VDSL modem up to the router. Didn't think it would work but just goes to prove how robust the system is over the wrong cable. Speed tests show I get pretty much the best speeds I can from VDSL too.

Going back to dial up. I first tried it when I inherited a USR portable modem. It didn't work though. I contacted USR and they tolde me that their modems had a lifetime warranty, so I sent it off. I'm pretty sure they didn't even look at it (I'd been in there resoldering potential dry joints) and said 'sorry it's no longer available but would you accept a newer faster version? It took me a whole bunch of seconds to decide. Interstingly here it goes back to some previous posts. I got a compuserve account (previous mention #1) and then we started to use it at work (mention#2) to get our department to start to see the potential of 'the net'.
But then, it brings me right back to this forum. Very early on in 'discovering' the internet I was looking for information to help me repair a Pioneer CD autochanger that had failed. I tried searching for a circuit diagram for that CD, and found a group called UKrepairfaq (or something similar). They had a section on CD repairs, great. Then I noticed they had a section on Pioneer CDs, excellent. There was even a specific section on Pioneer CD auto changers. Wow. How do I describe then, that there was a section on the specific model I owned, and then again a thread describing the details of the fault that I had and the root cause. That was the day, back in the nineties that I knew the Internet was going to be something. Forums like this are great but imagine finding something like this in the nineties? And yes using dialup.

But now? Nope FTTC broadband with 4G failover.
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Old 1st Sep 2020, 10:56 pm   #36
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

Quote:
Originally Posted by arjoll View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrBungle View Post
We still had EDI dialups at work until 2018. Now there’s software that emulates them over IP using virtual serial ports.
Was that modem to modem though? That's still do-able, at the peak of the dial-up era it was specialised carrier-grade head-ends (Southnet had USR x2 ones) and those are the things it's impossible to get spares for.
Yes nice metal canned Hayes Optima 28.8. We had to get a copper pair into the DC for it . Both it and our hot spare came from ebay.

Apparently the machine at the other end was an AS400 which was 15 years out of support and warranty...
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Old 2nd Sep 2020, 12:44 am   #37
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Originally Posted by SiriusHardware View Post
Connection between two machines was ideally(!) via a null-modem cable but often the use of actual modems was supported as well. This probably worked better in the USA where dialled calls to local numbers were free, unlike in the UK.
I remember that - playing Rise of the Triad with my new wife, she was at our rental and I would go to my parents. Free local residential calls in NZ

Quote:
Originally Posted by electronicskip View Post
I used to run a bulletin board via a Sinclair 48k and a prism VTX5000 Modem back in the day, my mum used to go mad when she wanted to use the phone and the Board was live with people posting as i seem to remember. I think the transmit speed was about 1200 baud?
A Spectrum? You were keen I bought an internal 2400 modem with my first pay after school to call the local ones, then when I finished uni (I did two years part time while working, two years full time - common way to do a BCom in Accounting in the early 90s) got a second line at my parents and a 14.4k modem to start my own - Maximus, Binkleyterm and Squish. Fidonet 3:770/630. That lasted a couple of years, until a new wife, new house and new mortgage meant that the BBS and Sky TV were luxuries that had to go...
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Old 2nd Sep 2020, 3:24 pm   #38
Graham G3ZVT
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Default Re: Does anyone still use a dialup internet connection?

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Originally Posted by duncanlowe View Post
One of the issues, that I experienced for a while, was that if you were online via a modem, and 'someone' decided to ring their mum it would drop your connection.
The double-beep call waiting tone would instantly disconnect most modems but it was easy to disable with #43#
Actually I found it useful to leave it enabled as the incoming call could be more important (to SWMBO) than what I was doing in line.

Quote:
Originally Posted by duncanlowe View Post
When we moved here 20 years ago, I had some extra wiring installed (BT 6 pair) to take the phone line up to the office to this switch before distributing back to the house phone lines. These days I use (until I replace it with proper cable) those twisted pairs to carry Ethernet from the VDSL modem up to the router. Didn't think it would work but just goes to prove how robust the system is over the wrong cable. Speed tests show I get pretty much the best speeds I can from VDSL too.
Yes indeed, two pair telephone cable is fine for 10/100 Ethernet at modest lengths, in spite of what the "experts" would have you believe.
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Old 3rd Sep 2020, 8:52 am   #39
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rambo1152 View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by duncanlowe View Post
One of the issues, that I experienced for a while, was that if you were online via a modem, and 'someone' decided to ring their mum it would drop your connection.
The double-beep call waiting tone would instantly disconnect most modems but it was easy to disable with #43#
Actually I found it useful to leave it enabled as the incoming call could be more importent (to SWMBO) than what I was doing in line.
But it wasn't an incoming call. Picking up a handset on the same line while the call was in progress affected the levels enough that the modem gave up.
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Old 3rd Sep 2020, 10:37 pm   #40
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Soon after I joined Plessey Ilford in 1969, we were given access to a time share computer [GEIS] via a genuine Teletype that was connected using a conventional dial telephone with its handset in the cradle of an acoustic coupler. This was my introduction to BASIC. Originally the connection was via an ordinary extension of the works' internal exchange. The site operators used to listen in on lines that were in use for long periods, and the resulting clicks would cause corruption of the run if occurting when uploading or downloading data, so we were provided with a direct outside line that bypassed the site operators (very useful for private calls!). After a couple of years the Teletype was replaced by an Olivetti that had a red and black ribbon that differentiated sent from received text. Unfortunately, as supplied, the Olivetti switched itself off after 20 mins of inactivity, which was shorter than the run time of one of our network analysis programs (ACNET$), so we had to get the Olivetti engineer to disable the time out. We also had to get him to modify the type wheel to differentiate letter O from number zero (the Teletype had used a slashed zero), fixed by him filing small gaps at the top and bottom of the zero character, which then resembled [ ].

Last edited by emeritus; 3rd Sep 2020 at 10:40 pm. Reason: Typo, clarification
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