Connection trouble

[rogersaurus]

Why can I only stay online for a maximum of 90-120 minutes before the connection becomes so slow and disconnecty that I have to reset my PC? I'll then get another 90 minutes but it's really irritating. My PC is decent spec. And I'm on dial-up obviously. Thanks.

[Cactus]

I have a theory on this - but it's only that. A theory that is. I saw on a Watchdog type program about a year ago that (and i won't name the ISP/Telecoms provider in question) certain ISP's "throttle" your bandwith if you fall into the category of "Heavy User". This was with one of those "free offpeak internet calls" packages. In this particular case, the ISP had issued customers it had labeled as "Heavy Users" a new dial up number which they had to change their connection settings to. When they tried to dial up, it was almost constantly busy. Some customers complained it sometimes took them an hour to get connected. This case was exposed to the TV program because someone internally (within the ISP) disagreed with this policy, and they showed copies of an internal email with quite incriminating evidence that this was being done deliberately so as to "put off" customers from spending so much time online during offpeak hours. Sneaky i know, but it goes on. My ISP, which shall remain nameless, gives the best service that i've experienced. For that reason, i am reluctant to change ISP's, even though the price of my package has gone up considerably over the last year or so. Having said that, if i spend too long online - i do suffer a drop in speeds, and get disconnected more frequently than if i'm only on for say 3 hours per evening. But it's not bad enough to make me seek an alternative ISP, not yet anyway. You'll probably think i'm just cynical, but i'm sure i'm not imagining it. What i'd really like is Broadband, but i've got no hope of that for at least the next couple of years as i live out in the sticks. Hope this sheds some light onto what you're experiencing.

[thoma?]

my theory is :get broadband. It's worth it.

[rinkytink]

I use Telewest unmetered dial up service. This used to be superb - connect first time and very good reponse times. Recently though the response times have become almost laughable. Telewest are on a big push at the moment to get people to use broadband - I seem to receive junk mail about broadband on a bi-weekly basis. It seems that the more Telewest try to sell me broadband the worse my dial-up connection gets !!! Go figure !!!

[rogersaurus]

Since asking the question, I've discovered that if I disconnect and reconnect every hour rather than waiting for automatic disconnection after 2 hours (I'm on freeserve) this sometimes saves me from having to restart my PC. Weird. I'd love Broadband but it's not available in my area yet (or in the near future probably), which probably explaines why I've escaped the majority of the Broadband sales push.

[whiskygalore]

From the horse's mouth, so to speak: "If you are using the Freeserve AnyTime service there is a limit of two hours for each connection to enable everyone to get high-quality access to the network throughout the day. If your connections keep ending at about this time this may well be the reason why."

[TheheftyGeorge]

Get a broadband you tom tug!