Arlo and Janis: Stupid Phone ! https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2022/02/01
I am with Arlo. The Johnny Cab in the first Total Recall movie, the good
one, turned me off self driving cars forever.
Lynn
On 2/1/2022 14:04, Lynn McGuire wrote:
Arlo and Janis: Stupid Phone !
https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2022/02/01
I am with Arlo. The Johnny Cab in the first Total Recall movie, the good
one, turned me off self driving cars forever.
Lynn
Yes, I agree with the first comment also. I like my land line; no
caller ID. I pick up the old Bell set, and just dial the number. I'm
the only person that I know who still knows almost everyone's number.
On Fri, 04 Feb 2022 12:33:06 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/1/2022 14:04, Lynn McGuire wrote:
Arlo and Janis: Stupid Phone !
https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2022/02/01
I am with Arlo. The Johnny Cab in the first Total Recall movie, the good >>> one, turned me off self driving cars forever.
Lynn
Yes, I agree with the first comment also. I like my land line; no
caller ID. I pick up the old Bell set, and just dial the number. I'm
the only person that I know who still knows almost everyone's number.
When the installers came for my forced [1] upgrade to optic fiber (not
an entirely unreasonable characterization, as rental movie downloads
are noticeably faster and large WiFi transfers are at least
occasionally temporarily reaching much higher speeds than before), the installers, after some discussion, decided to /not/ upgrade the
telephone, as there was no really practical way to do it [2].
They pointed out that, by keeping a copper land line, I had a phone
that would work even when the power went out. Everything optic
fibre-related, apparently, relies on boxes that rely on the
electricity staying on.
[1] To be fair, I received an email from my ISP last fall but couldn't
figure it out and decided to wait and see what happened. Well, what
happened is that they turned off DSL about 1/3 the way through Season
5 Ep 14 of Perry Mason -- which was rude. And then failed to call back
as promised about installing optic fiber. So I changed ISPs as well.
[2] The entry-point was examined, but the closest power was some ways
away, and the equpment would have needed an especially long optic
fiber cable because it would have had to be set up near the power
outlets. I think the very age of the house defeated them; the wired
telephone stuff had probably been installed when the house was new
(about 100 years ago) or whenever the telephone was first available in
this area.
And they had already installed the Internet stuff in the TV Table in
the front room, which had a convenient surge protector available, and
so had, in a very real sense, done their job.
On 2/5/2022 12:09, Paul S Person wrote:
On Fri, 04 Feb 2022 12:33:06 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/1/2022 14:04, Lynn McGuire wrote:
Arlo and Janis: Stupid Phone !
https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2022/02/01
I am with Arlo. The Johnny Cab in the first Total Recall movie, the good >>>> one, turned me off self driving cars forever.
Lynn
Yes, I agree with the first comment also. I like my land line; no
caller ID. I pick up the old Bell set, and just dial the number. I'm
the only person that I know who still knows almost everyone's number.
When the installers came for my forced [1] upgrade to optic fiber (not
an entirely unreasonable characterization, as rental movie downloads
are noticeably faster and large WiFi transfers are at least
occasionally temporarily reaching much higher speeds than before), the
installers, after some discussion, decided to /not/ upgrade the
telephone, as there was no really practical way to do it [2].
They pointed out that, by keeping a copper land line, I had a phone
that would work even when the power went out. Everything optic
fibre-related, apparently, relies on boxes that rely on the
electricity staying on.
[1] To be fair, I received an email from my ISP last fall but couldn't
figure it out and decided to wait and see what happened. Well, what
happened is that they turned off DSL about 1/3 the way through Season
5 Ep 14 of Perry Mason -- which was rude. And then failed to call back
as promised about installing optic fiber. So I changed ISPs as well.
[2] The entry-point was examined, but the closest power was some ways
away, and the equpment would have needed an especially long optic
fiber cable because it would have had to be set up near the power
outlets. I think the very age of the house defeated them; the wired
telephone stuff had probably been installed when the house was new
(about 100 years ago) or whenever the telephone was first available in
this area.
And they had already installed the Internet stuff in the TV Table in
the front room, which had a convenient surge protector available, and
so had, in a very real sense, done their job.
I'm not sure where you are, but in Ohio, I still have the slow old DSL
and copper phone line. No fiber optics available here. Comcast cable
is a faster option, but I prefer to pay half of that price to AT&T for
slow DSL and a traditional phone.
On 2/5/2022 12:09, Paul S Person wrote:
On Fri, 04 Feb 2022 12:33:06 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/1/2022 14:04, Lynn McGuire wrote:
Arlo and Janis: Stupid Phone !
https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2022/02/01
I am with Arlo. The Johnny Cab in the first Total Recall movie, the good >>>> one, turned me off self driving cars forever.
Lynn
Yes, I agree with the first comment also. I like my land line; no
caller ID. I pick up the old Bell set, and just dial the number. I'm
the only person that I know who still knows almost everyone's number.
When the installers came for my forced [1] upgrade to optic fiber (not
an entirely unreasonable characterization, as rental movie downloads
are noticeably faster and large WiFi transfers are at least
occasionally temporarily reaching much higher speeds than before), the
installers, after some discussion, decided to /not/ upgrade the
telephone, as there was no really practical way to do it [2].
They pointed out that, by keeping a copper land line, I had a phone
that would work even when the power went out. Everything optic
fibre-related, apparently, relies on boxes that rely on the
electricity staying on.
[1] To be fair, I received an email from my ISP last fall but couldn't
figure it out and decided to wait and see what happened. Well, what
happened is that they turned off DSL about 1/3 the way through Season
5 Ep 14 of Perry Mason -- which was rude. And then failed to call back
as promised about installing optic fiber. So I changed ISPs as well.
[2] The entry-point was examined, but the closest power was some ways
away, and the equpment would have needed an especially long optic
fiber cable because it would have had to be set up near the power
outlets. I think the very age of the house defeated them; the wired
telephone stuff had probably been installed when the house was new
(about 100 years ago) or whenever the telephone was first available in
this area.
And they had already installed the Internet stuff in the TV Table in
the front room, which had a convenient surge protector available, and
so had, in a very real sense, done their job.
I'm not sure where you are, but in Ohio, I still have the slow old DSL
and copper phone line. No fiber optics available here. Comcast cable
is a faster option, but I prefer to pay half of that price to AT&T for
slow DSL and a traditional phone.
On Sat, 05 Feb 2022 16:31:44 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/5/2022 12:09, Paul S Person wrote:
On Fri, 04 Feb 2022 12:33:06 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/1/2022 14:04, Lynn McGuire wrote:
Arlo and Janis: Stupid Phone !
https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2022/02/01
I am with Arlo. The Johnny Cab in the first Total Recall movie, the good >>>>> one, turned me off self driving cars forever.
Lynn
Yes, I agree with the first comment also. I like my land line; no
caller ID. I pick up the old Bell set, and just dial the number. I'm >>>> the only person that I know who still knows almost everyone's number.
When the installers came for my forced [1] upgrade to optic fiber (not
an entirely unreasonable characterization, as rental movie downloads
are noticeably faster and large WiFi transfers are at least
occasionally temporarily reaching much higher speeds than before), the
installers, after some discussion, decided to /not/ upgrade the
telephone, as there was no really practical way to do it [2].
They pointed out that, by keeping a copper land line, I had a phone
that would work even when the power went out. Everything optic
fibre-related, apparently, relies on boxes that rely on the
electricity staying on.
[1] To be fair, I received an email from my ISP last fall but couldn't
figure it out and decided to wait and see what happened. Well, what
happened is that they turned off DSL about 1/3 the way through Season
5 Ep 14 of Perry Mason -- which was rude. And then failed to call back
as promised about installing optic fiber. So I changed ISPs as well.
[2] The entry-point was examined, but the closest power was some ways
away, and the equpment would have needed an especially long optic
fiber cable because it would have had to be set up near the power
outlets. I think the very age of the house defeated them; the wired
telephone stuff had probably been installed when the house was new
(about 100 years ago) or whenever the telephone was first available in
this area.
And they had already installed the Internet stuff in the TV Table in
the front room, which had a convenient surge protector available, and
so had, in a very real sense, done their job.
I'm not sure where you are, but in Ohio, I still have the slow old DSL
and copper phone line. No fiber optics available here. Comcast cable
is a faster option, but I prefer to pay half of that price to AT&T for
slow DSL and a traditional phone.
Problem here is that AT&T can't keep the damned phone working. My DSL
was down for over a month, I finally called Cox and then told AT&T
that if they didn't have my DSL up before Cox came out they could
close my account. 3 days later I had working internet, but not from
AT&T.
On Sat, 05 Feb 2022 16:31:44 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/5/2022 12:09, Paul S Person wrote:
On Fri, 04 Feb 2022 12:33:06 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/1/2022 14:04, Lynn McGuire wrote:
Arlo and Janis: Stupid Phone !
https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2022/02/01
I am with Arlo. The Johnny Cab in the first Total Recall movie, the good >>>>> one, turned me off self driving cars forever.
Lynn
Yes, I agree with the first comment also. I like my land line; no
caller ID. I pick up the old Bell set, and just dial the number. I'm >>>> the only person that I know who still knows almost everyone's number.
When the installers came for my forced [1] upgrade to optic fiber (not
an entirely unreasonable characterization, as rental movie downloads
are noticeably faster and large WiFi transfers are at least
occasionally temporarily reaching much higher speeds than before), the
installers, after some discussion, decided to /not/ upgrade the
telephone, as there was no really practical way to do it [2].
They pointed out that, by keeping a copper land line, I had a phone
that would work even when the power went out. Everything optic
fibre-related, apparently, relies on boxes that rely on the
electricity staying on.
[1] To be fair, I received an email from my ISP last fall but couldn't
figure it out and decided to wait and see what happened. Well, what
happened is that they turned off DSL about 1/3 the way through Season
5 Ep 14 of Perry Mason -- which was rude. And then failed to call back
as promised about installing optic fiber. So I changed ISPs as well.
[2] The entry-point was examined, but the closest power was some ways
away, and the equpment would have needed an especially long optic
fiber cable because it would have had to be set up near the power
outlets. I think the very age of the house defeated them; the wired
telephone stuff had probably been installed when the house was new
(about 100 years ago) or whenever the telephone was first available in
this area.
And they had already installed the Internet stuff in the TV Table in
the front room, which had a convenient surge protector available, and
so had, in a very real sense, done their job.
I'm not sure where you are, but in Ohio, I still have the slow old DSL
and copper phone line. No fiber optics available here. Comcast cable
is a faster option, but I prefer to pay half of that price to AT&T for
slow DSL and a traditional phone.
Which I had until my former ISP (now a provider of email only, well,
once they get the account straightened out, anyway, maybe) decided to
drop DSL (at least in my area).
I had earlier seen devices in a local store for 5G home networking
but, with /no Internet/ and that store being temporarilyc closed [1],
I was somewhat limited in my choices.
Had I been paying closer attention, I might have solved the problem
more smoothly. A lot of the turmoil is my own fault. But not all of
it. The ISP bears responsibility also.
[1] It has been torn down and is being replaced with an "apartments
plus streetside retail" building. The business claimed it would be one
of those streetside retail stores, so, in a couple more years, it may
be available again.
On 2/6/2022 11:52, Paul S Person wrote:
On Sat, 05 Feb 2022 16:31:44 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/5/2022 12:09, Paul S Person wrote:
On Fri, 04 Feb 2022 12:33:06 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/1/2022 14:04, Lynn McGuire wrote:When the installers came for my forced [1] upgrade to optic fiber (not >>>> an entirely unreasonable characterization, as rental movie downloads
Arlo and Janis: Stupid Phone !
https://www.gocomics.com/arloandjanis/2022/02/01
I am with Arlo. The Johnny Cab in the first Total Recall movie, the good >>>>>> one, turned me off self driving cars forever.
Lynn
Yes, I agree with the first comment also. I like my land line; no
caller ID. I pick up the old Bell set, and just dial the number. I'm >>>>> the only person that I know who still knows almost everyone's number. >>>>
are noticeably faster and large WiFi transfers are at least
occasionally temporarily reaching much higher speeds than before), the >>>> installers, after some discussion, decided to /not/ upgrade the
telephone, as there was no really practical way to do it [2].
They pointed out that, by keeping a copper land line, I had a phone
that would work even when the power went out. Everything optic
fibre-related, apparently, relies on boxes that rely on the
electricity staying on.
[1] To be fair, I received an email from my ISP last fall but couldn't >>>> figure it out and decided to wait and see what happened. Well, what
happened is that they turned off DSL about 1/3 the way through Season
5 Ep 14 of Perry Mason -- which was rude. And then failed to call back >>>> as promised about installing optic fiber. So I changed ISPs as well.
[2] The entry-point was examined, but the closest power was some ways
away, and the equpment would have needed an especially long optic
fiber cable because it would have had to be set up near the power
outlets. I think the very age of the house defeated them; the wired
telephone stuff had probably been installed when the house was new
(about 100 years ago) or whenever the telephone was first available in >>>> this area.
And they had already installed the Internet stuff in the TV Table in
the front room, which had a convenient surge protector available, and
so had, in a very real sense, done their job.
I'm not sure where you are, but in Ohio, I still have the slow old DSL
and copper phone line. No fiber optics available here. Comcast cable
is a faster option, but I prefer to pay half of that price to AT&T for
slow DSL and a traditional phone.
Which I had until my former ISP (now a provider of email only, well,
once they get the account straightened out, anyway, maybe) decided to
drop DSL (at least in my area).
I had earlier seen devices in a local store for 5G home networking
but, with /no Internet/ and that store being temporarilyc closed [1],
I was somewhat limited in my choices.
Had I been paying closer attention, I might have solved the problem
more smoothly. A lot of the turmoil is my own fault. But not all of
it. The ISP bears responsibility also.
[1] It has been torn down and is being replaced with an "apartments
plus streetside retail" building. The business claimed it would be one
of those streetside retail stores, so, in a couple more years, it may
be available again.
Many companies are dropping DSL, I've heard. AT&T is doing that also in
many areas. I've also heard that companies that use AT&T's equipment >(resellers) have been forced off of their equipment. They call it >"progress"... maybe so. I'll probably be a hold-out until they pull the >plug.
On Mon, 07 Feb 2022 23:39:27 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
Many companies are dropping DSL, I've heard. AT&T is doing that also in
many areas. I've also heard that companies that use AT&T's equipment
(resellers) have been forced off of their equipment. They call it
"progress"... maybe so. I'll probably be a hold-out until they pull the
plug.
I was hoping the new ISP still had it, but it didn't. 5G apparently is
the domain of the smartphone companies, but I have seen ads now that I
am back online for what looks like the sort of Internet access an ISP provides.
If they do warn you they are going to pull the plug, I recommend
taking definite steps: examine the alternatives and convert /before/
you find yourself with no internet for a week or more. Keep in mind
that, if they are doing it to you, they are doing it to others and
that can be expected to produce a rush on new installations of other
options. And, of course, there is always staffing issues in a pandemic
and supply chain issues involving the new equipment.
There is nothing wrong with DSL -- as long as you are mostly
interested in downloading (ie, /not/ running a web site on it) and
aren't into streaming HD videos. SD from Amazon streamed well and,
with a little pre-planning, downloading the rental prevented any
network congestion problems. I would be happy using it to this day and
into the future, had things worked out that way. Still, fiber optic
Internet does work, once you get past any teething troubles.
Networking is a /very/ complicated topic.
Our State is apparently going to use some of that infrastructure money
that will be passing the Senate Any Day Now to provide High-Speed
Internet to the rural areas. I can only hope they will have enough
sense to encourage the 5G coverage to expand and use it instead of
stringing optic fiber everywhere (assuming it actually works for the Internet). But I suppose we must all be re-wired before the wires can
be cut.
On 2/8/2022 12:19, Paul S Person wrote:
On Mon, 07 Feb 2022 23:39:27 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
Many companies are dropping DSL, I've heard. AT&T is doing that also in >>> many areas. I've also heard that companies that use AT&T's equipment
(resellers) have been forced off of their equipment. They call it
"progress"... maybe so. I'll probably be a hold-out until they pull the >>> plug.
I was hoping the new ISP still had it, but it didn't. 5G apparently is
the domain of the smartphone companies, but I have seen ads now that I
am back online for what looks like the sort of Internet access an ISP
provides.
If they do warn you they are going to pull the plug, I recommend
taking definite steps: examine the alternatives and convert /before/
you find yourself with no internet for a week or more. Keep in mind
that, if they are doing it to you, they are doing it to others and
that can be expected to produce a rush on new installations of other
options. And, of course, there is always staffing issues in a pandemic
and supply chain issues involving the new equipment.
There is nothing wrong with DSL -- as long as you are mostly
interested in downloading (ie, /not/ running a web site on it) and
aren't into streaming HD videos. SD from Amazon streamed well and,
with a little pre-planning, downloading the rental prevented any
network congestion problems. I would be happy using it to this day and
into the future, had things worked out that way. Still, fiber optic
Internet does work, once you get past any teething troubles.
Networking is a /very/ complicated topic.
Our State is apparently going to use some of that infrastructure money
that will be passing the Senate Any Day Now to provide High-Speed
Internet to the rural areas. I can only hope they will have enough
sense to encourage the 5G coverage to expand and use it instead of
stringing optic fiber everywhere (assuming it actually works for the
Internet). But I suppose we must all be re-wired before the wires can
be cut.
They only offer up to 3 mb/s DSL here; it's enough to stream YouTube or
some streaming source on one device at a time. Certainly not for HD,
and big downloads are a pain. Basic browsing is OK.
I did get a flier in the mail recently from Verizon advertising 5G at
home fixed internet. I don't want satellite (I get fliers from
Hughesnet also). I'll have to start looking into these alternatives
before the time comes. Comcast has cable internet here, but it's more
than I care to pay if I can help it.
On Thu, 10 Feb 2022 13:37:56 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
On 2/8/2022 12:19, Paul S Person wrote:
On Mon, 07 Feb 2022 23:39:27 -0500, Michael Trew
<michael.trew@att.net> wrote:
Many companies are dropping DSL, I've heard. AT&T is doing that also in >>>> many areas. I've also heard that companies that use AT&T's equipment
(resellers) have been forced off of their equipment. They call it
"progress"... maybe so. I'll probably be a hold-out until they pull the >>>> plug.
I was hoping the new ISP still had it, but it didn't. 5G apparently is
the domain of the smartphone companies, but I have seen ads now that I
am back online for what looks like the sort of Internet access an ISP
provides.
If they do warn you they are going to pull the plug, I recommend
taking definite steps: examine the alternatives and convert /before/
you find yourself with no internet for a week or more. Keep in mind
that, if they are doing it to you, they are doing it to others and
that can be expected to produce a rush on new installations of other
options. And, of course, there is always staffing issues in a pandemic
and supply chain issues involving the new equipment.
There is nothing wrong with DSL -- as long as you are mostly
interested in downloading (ie, /not/ running a web site on it) and
aren't into streaming HD videos. SD from Amazon streamed well and,
with a little pre-planning, downloading the rental prevented any
network congestion problems. I would be happy using it to this day and
into the future, had things worked out that way. Still, fiber optic
Internet does work, once you get past any teething troubles.
Networking is a /very/ complicated topic.
Our State is apparently going to use some of that infrastructure money
that will be passing the Senate Any Day Now to provide High-Speed
Internet to the rural areas. I can only hope they will have enough
sense to encourage the 5G coverage to expand and use it instead of
stringing optic fiber everywhere (assuming it actually works for the
Internet). But I suppose we must all be re-wired before the wires can
be cut.
They only offer up to 3 mb/s DSL here; it's enough to stream YouTube or
some streaming source on one device at a time. Certainly not for HD,
and big downloads are a pain. Basic browsing is OK.
2.7 mb/s was enough here to stream SD films from Amazon (their minimum
is something like 0.98 mb/s). I appear to now have 10 mb/s, at least
when I measure it. But streaming Perry Mason (IMDbTV is streaming
only, because of the ads, I suspect) at the "best quality" of about
3.4 mb/s was choppy, while reducing this to "better quality" at 0.98
mb/s produced a smoothly-playing program. Downloading rentals that are
not IMDbTV hogs the bandwidth to the point that Edge claims the
Internet is not there -- just before the page finally loads. The
downloads are faster, though, reducing the pain.
I did get a flier in the mail recently from Verizon advertising 5G at
home fixed internet. I don't want satellite (I get fliers from
Hughesnet also). I'll have to start looking into these alternatives
before the time comes. Comcast has cable internet here, but it's more
than I care to pay if I can help it.
I believe I saw an online ad for Verizon 5G offering 10 mb/s for
$30/mo ... provided you had a cell phone with them. This "10 mb/s"
appears to be a standard bottom-most tier and higher capacities are,
no doubt, available for a higher cost; my new ISP claims something
like "up to 840 mb/s", which is a lot more than 10 mb/s.
My 10 mb/s optic fiber with my prior ISP would have run the same as my
DSL did -- about $50 -- plus $10/mo for equipment rental. The new ISP
bundles landline phone and Internet for $80/mo, and this seems to be comparable to the former land-line cost plus $50. Of course, the devil
is in the details, and I will need to get the next bill before I can
see the details.
There is also the matter of email. I wandered into a pattern of
multiple emails, so I am happy to be able to keep them all for
$4.95/mo. But whether your DSL ISP has this option is something you
might want to look into. Keeping the old emails can avoid a lot of
bother. Even keeping them for a few months while changing over to a
new set can be helpful. Or not, as the case may be for you.
| Sysop: | Keyop |
|---|---|
| Location: | Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, UK |
| Users: | 447 |
| Nodes: | 16 (2 / 14) |
| Uptime: | 64:38:33 |
| Calls: | 9,251 |
| Calls today: | 3 |
| Files: | 13,499 |
| Messages: | 6,067,659 |