Getting high on speed
Many many years ago I managed to persuade my boss to let me work from home.
This was in the days before the Interweb had ever been heard of, so it was unheard of for a computer programmer to work anywhere except at his terminal. I can’t remember what excuse I cooked up but they fell for it, and for quite a while, life was good – no commuting, no irritating office banter about sport, and best of all – no fucking boss breathing down my neck.
I had to have a special terminal, which I plugged into the mains and into the phone line. It had a clunky keyboard and a screen about four inches wide. If I typed a sentence, I had to wait about a minute for the characters to appear on the screen. It was cutting edge technology. It was fucking mighty. In those glory days, if you made a phone call, that was all you were charged for – the cost of making a phone call. So if you wanted to stay on the phone all day, it didn’t cost any extra. Brilliant. A day’s work cost just a few pence.
Years later, some eejit invented the Interweb, so this meant going on-line again. By now the bastards had started billing phone calls by the minute, so connecting to the Interweb was quite pricey. However, I did have a top of the range modem, so at least my connection was fast. Fifty six kilobits!!! Wow!!!!
Then some other twat invented something called Broadband.
I rang my phone company and asked about getting that. After the hysterical laughter subsided, they told me to forget the idea. They suggested I ring back in the middle of the next century.
I persevered though, over the years, and eventually a crowd stuck masts and weird gizmos all over the house. I had broadband.
I had some initial teething problems, but they only lasted about two years. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn’t. At one stage they came out to remove everything because they suddenly decided that broadband wasn’t available in my area. Some neighbours fell for that one, but I didn’t. I persevered. Eventually things settled down and broadband became just another part of life.
Last night, for the first time in I don’t know how many years, it went flaky. I don’t know exactly what happened, but suddenly I found myself in a time warp and back in the glory days of dial-up speeds. I also discovered that the Interweb doesn’t really work very well at those speeds any more.
It’s back at it’s normal speed today.
I lie. In fact, it is faster than ever. And I mean just that. I am getting speeds way above what I am meant to be getting. I’m not complaining.
It’s strange how one becomes accustomed to something so quickly.
What once was a miracle is now commonplace.
Hmm.. Familiar story.
Dial up for years, frst 14.4, then 28.8. Made the leap to 56k ignoring 33.6 along the way.
First “broadband” connection was 512k, then it automagically got up graded to 1Mb then 2Mb where after a while complacency set in and things seemed to slow down again.
Bit the bullet and got business broadband at 3Mb with a fixed IP. My ISP made a boo boo and I actually was given 4Mb. That got upgraded automagically a couple of years ago to 7.6Mb which is what I’m connected via now.
Complacency is beginning to set in again. Things seem to be slowing.
.-= robert´s last brainfart .. Maryland Zoo partners with the B&O Railroad, Maryland Science Center, and Port Discovery for the Months of January and February. =-.
The link love with my last brainfart at the bottom of my last comment is picking up the wrong feed for some reason.
I know nothing about the Maryland Zoo!!
.-= robert´s last brainfart .. Maryland Zoo partners with the B&O Railroad, Maryland Science Center, and Port Discovery for the Months of January and February. =-.
You must have got half of my bandwidth (Is that the term??)as I’m down to dial up speeds today…
Robert – I’m quite happy with my 3 Mb connection [it suits my needs], especially as I am now getting nearer 4!
I haven’t a clue what Maryland Zoo is doing on that feed. I have never heard of that blog before, and I doubt she’s heard of me. Some weird takeover bid?
King’s Bard – Nah! You’re with that crowd who told me to phone back in fifty years. Maybe that’s still their philosophy?
What’s all this desire for getting high on speed GD? Watching you free fall around the interweb at Mach 4, is making me dizzy!
Talking of speed and free fall – get a load of this guy!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/space/7061032/Skydiver-to-break-records-with-space-dive.html
.-= Geri Atric´s last brainfart .. FLITTING THOUGHTS =-.
I’m quite happy at Mach 3, Geri. I need a certain amount of speed otherwise it would take ages to download porn things. And I have no intention of jumping out of a baloon [or anywhere else for that matter].
Grandad its a good subject for me today as I downloaded Skype yesterday and was able to have a videocall with my brother in the States who I haven’t seen in years and his three year old son who I’ve not seen except in photos.
Clear as a bell and just like TV clarity- I’m like a pup with two tails over it. Sorry- irrelevant post really which has never stopped me before but I’ve been on about it all day.
Bloody great.
Hey Grandad, My first connection was also a 300 baud terminal over a phone line. Then of course came 14.4, 28.8 then the awesome 56.6. At the last place I lived I had a 760K DSL connection and that was hughly fast at the time. After signing up with Verizon Fios my connection was 25M down and 10M up. This became too expensive so I down graded to 20M up and down.
At my office they had a 3M connection and, to me, it was painfully slow!
It’s all what we get use to.
.-= Brianf´s last brainfart .. Kittens =-.
Early 80’s and my time in a comms department. 19.2k modem on a leased line supporting 20+ users sitting on teletype terminals 300 miles away. The modem was rack-mounted, about the size of two brief cases sitting on top of each other, and had handles on the side to help you lift it.
3 lights on the front – about the size of match boxes – power, DCD, and error. Ah romantic times!!
🙂
.-= Mick´s last brainfart .. The Emigrant Irish – A Vote =-.
Glad you’re up to speed and all that. I remember my first time having a home based Internet connection. Dial-up at a mind boggling 9600 baud. It took 3 days to download Netscape (my 486SX33 came with IE 2.0–blegh!).
This past summer we splurged and upped our broadband to 7.0 MB from 3.0 MB. It was nice for awhile until we finally come to the realization that you’re still at the mercy of whatever server(s) you’re trying to drag a site off of. If it wants to serve things up at 786 KB then you’re stuck with it.
It’s a conspiracy I tell ya’!
.-= Kirk M´s last brainfart .. Moving to the bedroom =-.
Captain – I have Skype on this laptop, so I know how good it is. I have used it many times, including conference calls involving America and Australia. Can you imagine that working on dial-up? Hah!
Brianf – I had a funny feeling you’d be on, as you never miss a chance to piss me off with your speeds? Incidentally, while I’m on to you, I’ll be sending over a fairly large order shortly for ammunition. We want to be ready for the tourist season.
Mick – All I remember about my terminal was that the smallest part was the screen. It was almost impossible to read, it was so small. I’m not sure why, as we had clunky fourteen inch monitors in work [the good old green on black!]
Kirk M – A 486SX33? Spoiled brat. My first was a 386SX16. The good old days when you had to specify a 3.5″ floppy, else they came with a 5.25″ one. I wonder what we would have made of a glimpse thirty or so years into the future?
What once was a miracle is now commonplace.
That’s how I feel about my own herself.
.-= rhodester´s last brainfart .. God Hates Gaga? Say it ain’t so! =-.
I’m going to tell her you said that.
Grandad – The 486 was my second computer. I started out like you did with the exception that mine was a 386SX33 w/ 2MB of Memory (640K conventional memory and you had to have the driver in order to use “high memory”, remember?). I splurged and spent $40.00 for an additional 2MB so I had a whopping 4 MBs to play with! Couldn’t see the sense in anything that came before the 386SX33 since I had all those main frames to play around with.
Used to play the original Wolfenstein on that sucker, though.
.-= Kirk M´s last brainfart .. Moving to the bedroom =-.
Mine was duel speed. I could run at 8 or 16MHz, though I never used 8. Don’t know why. Wasn’t it the MEM.SYS file that had to be tweaked? Can’t remember now. I used to play Wolfenstein too, and MS Flight Simulator [version 2, I think] with its glorious wireframe graphics.
“What once was a miracle is now commonplace.”
An absolutely dead-on explanation on the danger of marriage. You are, once again, to be commended!
.-= Nick´s last brainfart .. The State of Newspapers =-.
Nick – I know fuck all about computers, but I’m an expert on marriage. *sigh*
Grandad – Hell, I totally forgot about those dual speed 386’s. I used to see them with a button on the front that “shifted” the thing from 8mhz to 16mhz and back again. Right next to the “Reset” button. I think it had something to do that programs didn’t have any internal regulation back then so programs (like games) that were designed to to run on a 8mhz processor went to damn fast on a 16mhz processor hence the switch.
And yeah, I think it was the MEM.SYS file you at least had to have installed in order to access memory above 640k. Yup, those were the days when the OS (DOS) was an open book.
I had a feeling you would be expecting me.
Is your order the same as last years?
Maybe you might be interested in some more anti-SUV rockets or some the experimental anti-politician fragmentation grenades?
.-= Brianf´s last brainfart .. Kittens =-.
Kirk M – I wonder why they don’t have those switches any more? 2GHz to 8MHz? Heh!
Brianf – Sorry, but due to the recession, I am going to have to cut back slightly on the ammunition [not so many tourists expected this year]. Similarly, SUVs are virtually a thing of the past here. I will be ordering a large stock of anti-politician fragmentation grenades though. Do you have the Napalm filled versions?