Hello Again

[hawkida]

My new house rocks.*

NTL don't.

I've come into work for a rest.

*Not literally. Foundations are stable.

Comments

[sbisson.livejournal.com]

Congrats. Hope the move wasn't too stressful.

Peterborough Good NTL Bad

[swisstone.livejournal.com]

Hope you're settling in well, and that you'll be online at home soon, so I can witter at you over Yahoo Messenger.

[squeakyg.livejournal.com]

I missed you.

[hawkida.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if "thanks" is an appropriate response to that, but, well: Thanks. It's good to be appreciated.

I'm only semi-back until NTL get their act together. I have dial-up at home but it's slow and it's via the laptop, hence rather awkward, so my access will be mainly from work until I get the broadband account fixed up.

Then I'll bore everyone with pictures of the house and possibly pictures of my neice, too.

[squeakyg.livejournal.com]

On dial-up, you get to experience what the internet is like for me. All. The. Time. Too unbearable for you, eh? My life is pretty unbearable, yeah.

[hawkida.livejournal.com]

Er, do you have to pay per minute despite paying for a no-further-fees service, use an operating system you're not familiar with, a browser that's not set up to your preferences, a teeny little mouse and hunch over the computer that has to sit on the floor in order to access the internet? Cos that's why I prefer not to use the laptop right now apart from cursory checks to ensure I'm not missing urgent emails.

[squeakyg.livejournal.com]

Well, not quite. I get a fairly old computer that's set the way I like it, and an unmetered connection that is adequate for the price.

I just meant the slowness of 56k dial-up. It is all I've ever used. It kind of gets to me when broadband users talk about 56k dial-up as if it is unbearably primative. Kinda thought that's what you meant. But it's the unfamiliar laptop mainly, huh?

[valamelmeo.livejournal.com]

not to butt in or anything...but even before i had ever had broadband, i thought 56k dialup was unbearably slow and primitive. then again, i'm very impatient with these sorts of things.

I used to dream of 56k ...

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

Until I got my cable modem last year, I was on 28k8! And had only upgraded to that not much before. In fact, I was running a Pentium 60 with the 28k modem until some point last year and doing fine with that (did all my web surfing from work, just used the dial up, on a timed switch to start up Win95, email/conferencing in startup group and a "connect and download" script in the software. I'd come in of an evening, pick up the remote control (20 quid from wickes for two sockets and a radio controller switch) and start up the machine upstairs, about 20 seconds later I'd hear the POST beep telling me the machine was powering up, about a minute or so later I'd hear the modem dialling out, and then about five minutes after that I'd saunter upstairs and check to see what had arrived so far.)

The cable modem really does make such a difference to my home computer experience. I download tons of stuff from the web, I have streaming radio from around the world (which is routed through to the hifi in the computer room (back bedroom) so that I can tape it to minidisc or just listen to it through a proper hifi system), and I surf the web from home now ...

... I highly recommend (if you can afford it and it's available in your area and your landlord permits it) getting broadband, but only if you're prepared to be stuck on the PC even more than before ...

[hawkida.livejournal.com]

I'm not going to pretend the speed isn't an issue - when you're used to faster it is, but the speed alone would be easily bearable. It's the other issues, like the slightly different keyboard layout and the flatter keyboard, the tiny mouse and small amount of space to use it in, but mostly the sitting on the floor all hunched over and the knowledge that I'm paying out money I shouldn't need to. Don't get me wrong - I love my laptop, it's great. But it's not a perfect solution to my current problem.