Really, just to respond to the <rant> here, this is a problem that a lot of ISPs run into. Here's a basic run down of why. Some ISPs don't use very advanced equipment. And even those that do, there are always issues of software and of telecommunications isssues. Some small town ISPs are, for lack of a better comment, cheap bastards. They purchase 33.6 bps modems, and have them flash upgraded to whatever standard they need. So when you dial into your ISP, you're getting one of these cheap modems. Now, when a customer logs on, and then decides they've had their fill of all things Internet, the modem doesn't kill the call. So there's a modem there, that could be used, but is not! National average, for a dialup session is between 25 and 35 minutes. Yes there are those people that spend hours upon hours on the Internet, but across the board, you can say that most people spend 30 minutes on line. So as an ISP admin, you come across busy signals for users, or some other issue(Such as percieved paranoia by the ISP in your case Randy.), they kill the call to allow others to dial in. Even on more "advanced" equipment, the same problem comes into play. My day job is to monitor the worlds largest dialup network. (One of our customers, and our largest customers is AOL.) We have 3Com cards in modem racks around the world that cost anywhere from $10,000 to $5,000 EACH. Some of these modem cards have 24 modems, some of them have 4 modems on them. The code itself is pretty good, and there are some customers that have hours they spend on line with no problems. But at the same time, there are other problems such as code, or errors on the circuit that give incorrect information and a call appears to be a hung call. Where the call is no longer there, but the circuit and/or modem thinks it's still being used. So to combat that, a lot of local ISPs just do resets of modems after a certain time. Some of them do it via a script, some actually go and do it manually. And for these local ISPs, if you antagonize the owner or company, they my seek you our and drop your call. (I've known this to happen!) As far as your hardware causing a disconnect, it is possible. For example, V.90 has a "bug" that when downloading large email attachments, it may take a piece of the data, and confuse it as a disconnect singal. When you're downloading saying a 1Mb email message, and your modem tries to renegotiate the speed, it may get 10 digits of data, then pause. Well those last 3 digits may be seen as a disconnect command, and then do so. There's also the issue of line noise. This is harder to prove, but it's very possible and does happen quite often. Right behind my house runs a major highway, with semis of all sizes flying by. Hitting a bump in the road, and a semi's bouncing and vibration can shake a telephone pole and create line noise. The only problem is, that's a draw back of analog signals, and it's hard to prove unless it was being monitored at the exact moment. So the information you were given, does hold some truth to it, but I more suspect, that in your instance, your ISP may have been irritated with your call and is doing this purposely. :0) Hope that clears things up a little for ya. tdh -- T. Holmes ----------------- UNIXTECHS.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] ----------------- "Real Men Use Vi!" Uptime: -------------------------------------------------------------------- 1:55pm up 4 days, 5:41, 6 users, load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00 -------------------------------------------------------------------- | <rant> | (Except that my ISP has changed his rules since I signed up, and now | considers that if I remain connected for more than 4 to 12 hours (I | forget the exact rules), I am "hanging", and he takes it upon himself to | disconnect me. I can reconnect, but he seems to have his watchful eye | on me -- since I found out about the change in policy (I wasn't | notified), and when I called to find out what the problem was, I was | told that this policy was on the contract I signed (it isn't), and since | that phone call I'm quite certain I get disconnected more often than I | did before that phone call. (I should start a collection of logs, but | they claim that not all of the disconnections come from them -- some of | them might be from the phone company or other causes (my hardware? I | don't think so). Anyway, I didn't mean to get into that, but if anyone | knows how I can determine the cause of a disconnection not at my end of | the phone line, please let me know.) | </rant> | | Here is a page I've started for the purpose of assembling information | about metered access to the Internet (or email). | | * http://twiki.org/cgi-bin/view/Test/MeteredInternetAccess | | Thanks, | Randy Kramer ------------------------------------------------------------------
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