a salute to those on mobile connection...

brownboy66

cause my phone line has died So I'm forced to use this mobile connection instead. How can you stand it?! And I thought landline broadband was slow (and it is - especially at just 256k - but its an absolute lightning bolt compare to this thing). This is so slow I could make a cup of tea inbetween sentences! Aishah - you have my respect being on a mobile connection full time!

anyway - sorry for the rant. Hopefully our MTNL man will drop by tomorrow and put me out of my misery......

shashank.aggarwal

Which GPRS do you use...I have the Idea connection and it does give what it claims..

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brownboy66

Hi Shashank. Its a cdma 1x connection - and its working at the speed its suppose to - but oh! What's more - I have an EVDO PDA that also acts as a bluetooth modem - but not much use here. Back home when I used it - I would regularly get 4-500 kbits per second. Anyway - the helpful MTNL guys will be here at midday so here's hoping!

so I'm picking India to beat Australia today in the cricket!

Aishah

Mine is Airtel GPRS - it gives almost the same speed as our dial-up but in certain times of the day it becomes very slow. If I have something really important to send,I disconnect mobile and connect to our dial-up (46.6 somethings per something - sorry i am not a techie!!)but dial-up speed is fairly consistent 24 hours. I have the mobile so i don't tie up the only telephone line to our premises! I think I mentioned I cut up the salad while i wait! At present I am doing the washing, hanging it out etc. as each page is coming. Now i know I can do it however (GPRS that is - it took me ages to finally get it correct)I shall take my computer to Mussoorie next year and buy a local SIM Airtel and use it there. Very early morning is usually good and later at night as far as speed goes, but it is never any faster than dial-up landline. We still don't have Broadband..

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Aishah

Took a look at statistics on my connection profile - this might mean something to you - Max out is 26.2kb and In is 48.0kb.

India v Australia - now this is something!! I am predicting Oz to win and the final will be NZ v Oz!!!

Dilliwala

Ah, finally an ON-topic tech thread
With the usual OFF-topic cricket talk, started by, who else! - my mate brownboy.
Did u really think by turning the agenda (tech off-topic, cricket on-topic) upside-down that I wudn't track u down? FAT CHANCE! (I wonder if we are the first case of mutual cyber-stalking on the web? )

Anyway, seriously, have u considered a second POT (that's Plain Old Telephone, Aishah) line? That way u cud use dial-up at least, if your main line drops out. I believe one or other company has rent-free options as well, so u pay only for what u use. Plus installation charges of course.
Hint: I did try thru an MTNL calling card once but cudn't get that set-up to work. Did everything as it says in Windows about setting up calling-cards for internet access, with the necessary delays for dialing additional nos., but bloody Windows kept dialling all numbers without a break, which doesn't work in MTNL's scheme of things.

Aishah

Yes, Dilliwalla I have 2 connections - read previous post! and now i am using dial-up because GPRS has become too slow and I have a quick question to ask you techies! When GPRS is particularly slow and is working to bring up a page the phone starts getting hot. is this a problem? It will also become hot if I do a long download (very short in time if you had Broadband but recently i used it to connect myself to MSN Messenger) and the download took for ages via GPRS. There are updates to the Sagem phone connection but these take forever too... The heat is the main question - will it damage the phone?

Dilliwala

My question was for brownboy (I put in the POT explanation for u on the off-chance that u MIGHT ask for it ). Maybe that wasn't clear - I'll amend my post.
(BTW, a normal phone line is called a POT line. U have only one of those, as per your previous post, plus Airtel. 2 connections, but only one POT).

Re your hot phone - is this happening while downloading pics of half-naked men, by any chance?
Sorry, cudn't resist that. I have no idea about GPRS. I did know what the abbreviation stood for in the past, but having neither desire nor need for GPRS, I haven't learnt up on it. I'm sure brownboy can give better info, but I'd say that regular heating-up over an extended period of time can't be good for the fone. Easier to say than do, but when using GPRS try to limit yourself to sites with more text and fewer graphics.
U can also turn off all unnecessary graphics/sound/images in Internet Explorer 6 or 7 (I presume that's what u use), and then if there are any on a particular page that u need, there will be an individual link to d/l just that pic/graphic/whatever.
On the top of this page, click Tools, then Internet Options, then Advanced. Move half-way down the menu to the 'Multimedia' sub-menu. Untick any of the following that might be ticked:
Play animations in web pages
Play sound in web pages
Play videos in web pages
Show pictures

Try it and see if that helps. Cheers.

Aishah

thanks for hints, Dilliwalla! (By the way, no need for me downloading those pics... won't say anymore!) I think I will just turn off, disconnect when the phone is slow and heating up - I don't want to sit at the computer all day anyway. Also, thank you for the initials POT enlightenment - i did misunderstand your post and I can see your helfulness to me from some of my previous posts!!! Now I am going to write down your suggestions in my 'Stuff to do with computers' book..

Aishah

Dilliwalla - if I turn off animations does that mean your laughing, lying down man doesn't show???

No need to answer - he is as dead as a dodo!!

Dilliwala

Just checked it out - with animations turned off, he does show, except he's not animated! Legs straight out, but head facing u, mouth open. Looks really weird - like one of those frogs at a mini-golf course with it's mouth open as the hole!
Correction - with 'Show pictures' turned off none of the icons on this page show, avtars, green lights, triangles included, nor is there a link to 'show' them individually ( but right-clicking on them and clicking on 'Show Picture' will turn them on individually). However 'genuine' pics (.jpg, .jpe) will be on 'standby', i.e. a grayed-out area or similar, plus a link, clicking which will then d/l the pic.

EDIT: Ok, cross-posted, just seen your edit after posting this.

brownboy66

well you just watch yourself as well cause I'm keeping a look out for your off topic tech discussions cleverly disguised as acronyms, maps, etc!

GPRS stands for general packet radio service by the way. Oh and Aishah - are you using a 48k modem? (presumably that's why you're getting 48k download). I have a 56k modem that you can have. Its siting in a box doing nothing at the moment.

Now - if you are stuck with low speed dial up like services (whether on a phone line or via mobile) there is a way you can augment it. Windows has always supported a service called multilink. What it does is to allow a pc/ laptop to dial up multiple lines at the same time and aggregate the bandwidth. So if you have two telephone lines - each with a modem getting say 48k - it will aggregate the two to give you a speed of 96k. Likewise - you can get it to dial up a landline, a mobile USB modem - and aggregate the two together. Important to note:

1) your ISP has to support multilink PPP

Anyway - worth a try if you're stuck with dial up. What would be nice is the next step mobile data services from the current GSM GPRS, and CDMA 1x networks currently in India (called EVDO on a cdma network - and UMTS for GSM). Really good speeds.

Dilliwala

Alright, don't hold back, so how does one turn multi-link on?
Is this the same as what's called Multimode in ADSL modems (not routers)? My modem is set to 'Multimode', the other options being 'T1.413', 'G-Lite' and 'G-DMT'. So if I'm using this on one POT line, how do I activate multi-link with a dial-up modem on the other line?

brownboy66

no, no, no.....multimode is a setting that allows the router to detect the variant of DSL you have. Oh...and you do have have router by the way Dilli. Modem stands for "modulation demodulation" which is what has to happen to send digital information over an analogue phone line (which is what you had to do in the days of dial up as PCs are digital - while phone lines are analogue). DSL, on the other hand, is digital end to end - so no modulation demodulation - hence no modem. DSL modem has become the slang term for the DSL connection device - but its actually a router. This also explains why you have to have a PC tuner card to view TV signals - PC monitors a digital while standard TV signals are analogue.

Anyway - if you have windows you'll find multilink under the network connections/ setup new dial up connection. In XP it tends to be greyed out (its actually easier to set up under windows 98se). Let me know how you go.

Aishah

Dilliwalla - I turned off animations,video,but not pictures or sound because i like to listen to ABC Radio national early in the morning when mobile is fast working. I also like looking at pictures and if GPRS gets too slow then I just switch off. For an emergency I go to dial-up, and I use Outlook for connection to my email - for this I use dial-up landline.
bb - I will have to 'pick your brains' re speeding up landline or mobile, can hardly understand your post but sounds fascinating, when next I come to Delhi! If only Broadband or Fraudband as Nick calls it, would come our way...