 The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group Internet Newsletter No 10 George Skarbek gskarbek@melbpc.org.au |
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Since my last newsletter, our services have been performing very well and we
have no real problems of any type at the moment apart from the very occasional Intranet modem failing.
However, we have adequate spare capacity on the Intranet lines and we are reviewing the future of these
remaining banks of old modems.
Bonus Time
The Internet team is constantly doing its best to improve our ISP service without increasing prices; in fact
we have already reduced the prices by absorbing the GST. The latest trial initiative is to allow users to
stay connected even when all of their time has been used up, provided there are free lines available.
The way that this new system works is that when your allocated time is used up, the timer program
interrogates the banks of modems to determine how many free lines exist. If more than 25% of the lines are
free then you will not be disconnected and can remain online until you either hang up or the modems start to
fill.
Please Note that the bonus time applies to the specific call when you exceed allocated normal time
and at least 25% of modems in the modem bank are free.
After your allocated time for a 24-hour period has been exceeded, you will be disconnected on attempting to
log-in again until the start of a next log-in day. You can of course log in again and be eligible for bonus
extension time if your allocated time has not been exceeded
This bonus means that you may be able to stay connected for many hours during periods of low modem usage and
the main bonus will be during the weekend. Generally there are few spare modems during the weekday evening
peak from 6 pin to about 1 am but many more are free during weekends. To view the pattern of modem usage from
the Message Of The Day (MOTD) page,
http://hww.melbpc.org.au/motd/ click on Useful Links, System Statistics and then select "Melbpc Dial-Up
Server statistics". The vertical axis shows the number of modems in use and the horizontal axis is the time
on a 24-hour clock reading from left to right. The line at the extreme right-had side is the number of modems
in use at the minute of your viewing. From the MOTD page you will be shown not only the time that you have
used but also the number of free lines that represents the bonus limit.
Your personal timer information at the bottom of the MOTD page also lists the number of "free lines" - this
figure represents the number of modems currently available up to the "25% free" limit described above.
This bonus time is due to the programming effort of one of our Internet team members. However, I would remind
all of our users that all these additional benefits are on a trial basis as if we lose our fixed price
wholesale Internet feed then we will have to pay for all the bytes that come down the line and we will have
to revert to our written agreement of providing a maximum of two hours per day irrespective of the time of
day.
Finally a reminder that even after you have used up all your time and there is no bonus time left, you can
still receive and send and read the newsgroups by dialling into the Intranet line on 9690 5644. The main
restriction on this line is that surfing the web is generally not possible. You may be lucky and find some
sites in the cache on our hard disk but there is no link to the outside world. Intranet stands for internal
network.
Line drops out on first call and stays connected on subsequent call
I may have found one solution to the problem that some users have been reporting for some time, namely when
they ring the first time, the line always drops within a few seconds but the next call is stable. Several
users have reported success in fixing the problem using the steps below.
The settings in Outlook Express were the culprit. All was well until the users added and then removed free
ISPs and then the problems started.
If you have these conditions then to fix this problem you must remove the non-existent ISPs from the accounts
by clicking on Tools, Accounts and then click on Delete.
To be on the safe side I suggest that you also uncheck the "Always connect to this account using" by clicking
on Tools, Accounts, Mail tab, Properties, Connection and remove the "Always connect to this account using"
tick even from the default account. If you don't click on Outlook Express to connect then unchecking this box
will not make any difference. Without this tick, you will have to click on the dialler to make the connection
and then open Outlook Express.
I am not suggesting that this will cure all problems where the line drops out immediately and then is stable,
but there is a probability that it may fix some.
Reprinted from the June 2000 issue of PC Update, the magazine of Melbourne PC User Group, Australia
