Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Why do I keep coming back to this thought? IS it because I'm pessimistic? Cynical? Tomorrow at 10:00 am, it will be exactly 2 weeks! This is unbelievable!</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">www.getdway.com Satellite Internet $500 to install and $60 a month, or $100 intsall and $100 a month for 1 year.

Geo if they continue to not figure out the problem, and it is not on your end, then you might have no alternative but to seek satisfaction through your states attnery Generals office. At least recover the cost of your down time.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">YOU THINK AT&T is evil? Do business with D-way and you'll be hating life real quick like. They require a service contract, and THEY DO NOT SUPPORT their product at all. You have down time, tuff! Speeds down are intermittent and often only as fast as your current phone line. Up loads are horribly slow and agonizingly problematic.

STAY AWAY FROM SATELLITE ACCESS!</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Yep, satellite sucks when compared to DSL or Cable, but it is basically storm damage proof, and the down link speed is actually quite good. In the one adventure that I have that actually makes money every month, I rely on satellite connectivity to move data. It is all inbound to me except for some error checking. On the few days a month where weather prevents connectivity it falls back to six phone lines. A 2 hour window is needed on the dish, and that turns into about 18 hours on the POT’s. If both go down, I try to connect remotely with the cable, if that fails, then I get in the pickup and start burning CD’s all over the metro area. Some of them are easy to work with and will hand me the data at the door, but others won’t even give me a local burner to use.

Until I get a T1, I will continue to use the satellite. Once the T1 gets here, then I’ll switch to frame relays and use the dish as the back up system.

A note that OT's to another thread; The first 2K BLaster patch took my RRAS server down! God only knows how much I hate hackers!

[ August 15, 2003, 15:42: Message edited by: Thermodyne ]

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

Geo, Narrew brings up a good point. Maybe you should pole the Users here for anyone that works for your local phone company or DSL provider. It certaintly can't hurt to have an "SEIV insider". Hehe.

Or better yet, you could give us their email addresses so that all of us suffering from massive SEIV withdrawal could send them nice little letters explaining our situation.

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

I'm not quite sure Geo wants to make too much of a stink about who and what the loss of his DSL is affecting. While not saying he's breaking any policy or rules, I suspect he'd rather not "test" the issue.

Just my HO.

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

Well, the day is over half completed and still no sign of a working DSL line. I guess this means another weekend without gaming http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif .

Obviously, technology is growing to the point that it's surpassing the intelligence of the people that maintain it.

Which, BTW, is one reason I didn't get DSL (too many horror stories about the stupid technicians who tried to install it).

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

The saga continues...

The phone compnay did one Last check at the CO and and did not find the source of the problem. They have scheduled a meeting with the DSL techs and the phone company techs at the same time to work together and find the issue. That meeting will not take place until Tuesday.

I can no longer sit here doing nothing hoping the DSL will be back up some day and I am aggresivly persuing a few possible options about getting an alternate server set up, at least on a temporary basis. Honestly I should have done this two weeks ago but I was lulled to inaction by the prospect of the DSL getting restored at any moment.

I expect I will have a busy weekend trying to get something going. Hopefully I will be succesful and you all will be able to have access to PBW again this weekend sometime. I will keep you updated as always.

Geoschmo

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Strange. At least here in Germany, is is the simplest thing in the world. You just get 2 units, Splitter and Modem, for easy and nearly idiot-proof self-installation. (idiot-proof: proof until someone makes a better idiot) Then you just have to hope that someone at the phone company manages to switch DSL on. DSL outage can happen, but is becoming less frequent, about half an hour every three months here and right now.

But, on the other hand, here in Germany I don't know any weird installations with analog lines and DSL - I don't even know if you are able to get them here. ISDN and DSL, thats the standard. And phone companies use a pricing policy that effectivly discourages the usage of analog lines.

[ August 15, 2003, 20:36: Message edited by: Roanon ]

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">That must be the optimist in you ( http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif ). For my part, seeing that it wasn't fixed in 4 or 5 days after both types of techs looked at it, I had my doubts that it would ever be fixed. It may still be fixed but failure to do so into the 3rd week sure says a lot for how pathetic the service technicians/companies are.

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

Well, Roanon, the problem here seems (at first) to have been the surprise. By far, the majority of the Internet Users had dialup. But "one day", broadband became HOT and cable and telephone companies went after customers like crazy (hoping to get them and then have them forever...in other words, banking on the reluctance of a customer to not make a change once they have a broadband connection).

Around that time, DSL scheduling was running around 2 weeks wait time. Besides the number of people who wanted DSL, there was a shortage of phone company techs who knew anything about it. There is where all the horror stories came from. So, even after 4-5 years and with DSL expanding more and more, we still have idiots servicing the circuits. And, as is usually the case in a capitalist-driven society, more emphasis is placed on getting even MORE customers than there is making sure you can take care of what you have.

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

Yep, Slynky, we had the same sudden "HOT" period. But 2 weeks waiting time... you could only dream of. For some reasons unknown to me, it took months to get it. But if that means they did a better and more reliable job in supplying DSL, I definitely prefer that choice - especially as the waiting times are history now http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif German Telekom effectively still had a monopoly in these times, it looks like there are certain aspects in which pure capitalism isn't preferable.

[ August 15, 2003, 21:11: Message edited by: Roanon ]

Re: PBW Down? - Back up!
 

Took me about a week to get it IIRC, and I set it up myself. Was no problem. Until two weeks ago that is... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif