Dial-up Internet access is a form of Internet access Common methods of Internet access include dial-up, landline , T- lines, Wi-Fi, satellite and cell phones that uses telephone lines A telephone line or telephone circuit is a single-user circuit on a telephone communications system. Typically this refers to the physical wire or other signaling medium connecting the user's telephone apparatus to the telecommunications network, and usually also implies a single telephone number for billing purposes reserved for that user.^[1] The user's computer or router A router is an electronic device that interconnects two or more computer networks, and selectively interchanges packets of data between them. Each data packet contains address information that a router can use to determine if the source and destination are on the same network, or if the data packet must be transferred from one network to another uses an attached modem A modem is a device that modulates an analog carrier signal to encode digital information, and also demodulates such a carrier signal to decode the transmitted information. The goal is to produce a signal that can be transmitted easily and decoded to reproduce the original digital data. Modems can be used over any means of transmitting analog connected to a telephone line to dial into an Internet service provider An Internet service provider , also sometimes referred to as an Internet access provider (IAP), is a company that offers its customers access to the Internet[citation needed]. The ISP connects to its customers using a data transmission technology appropriate for delivering Internet Protocol Paradigm, such as dial-up, DSL, cable modem, wireless or's (ISP) node to establish a modem-to-modem link, which is then used to route A router is an electronic device that interconnects two or more computer networks, and selectively interchanges packets of data between them. Each data packet contains address information that a router can use to determine if the source and destination are on the same network, or if the data packet must be transferred from one network to another Internet Protocol The Internet Protocol is a protocol used for communicating data across a packet-switched internetwork using the Internet Protocol Suite, also referred to as TCP/IP packets between the user's equipment and hosts.

The term was coined during the early days of computer telecommunications Telecommunication is the transmission of messages, over significant distances, for the purpose of communication. In earlier times, telecommunications involved the use of visual signals, such as smoke, semaphore telegraphs, signal flags, and optical heliographs, or audio messages via coded drumbeats, lung-blown horns, or sent by loud whistles, for when modems were needed to connect terminals A computer terminal is an electronic or electromechanical hardware device that is used for entering data into, and displaying data from, a computer or a computing system. Early terminals were inexpensive devices but very slow compared to punched cards or paper tape for input, but as the technology improved and video displays were introduced, or computers running terminal emulator A terminal emulator, terminal application, term, or tty for short, is a program that emulates a video terminal within some other display architecture. Though typically synonymous with a command line shell or text terminal, the term terminal covers all remote terminals, including graphical interfaces. A terminal emulator inside a graphical user software to mainframes Mainframes are powerful computers used mainly by large organizations for critical applications, typically bulk data processing such as census, industry and consumer statistics, enterprise resource planning, and financial transaction processing, minicomputers A minicomputer is a class of multi-user computers that lies in the middle range of the computing spectrum, in between the largest multi-user systems (mainframe computers) and the smallest single-user systems (microcomputers or personal computers). The class at one time formed a distinct group with its own hardware and operating systems, but the, online services An online service provider can for example be an internet service provider, email provider, news provider , entertainment provider (music, movies), e-shopping site (online stores), e-finance or e-banking site, e-health site, e-government site, Wikipedia, Usenet (commonly accessed through Google Groups).[clarification needed] In its original more and bulletin board systems via a telephone line.

Availability

Dial-up connections to the Internet require no infrastructure Infrastructure is the basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise, or the services and facilities necessary for an economy to function. The term typically refers to the technical structures that support a society, such as roads, water supply, sewers, power grids, telecommunications, and so forth other than the telephone network A Telephone Network is a type of telecommunications network used for telephone calls between two or more parties. As telephone access is widely available, dial-up remains useful to travelers. Dial-up is usually the only choice available for rural or remote Rural Internet is the access to the Internet from rural areas , which are settled places outside towns and cities. Inhabitants live in villages, hamlets, on farms and in other isolated houses areas where broadband installations are not prevalent due to low population and demand. Dial-up access may also be an alternative for users on limited budgets as it is offered for free by some ISPs, though broadband is increasingly available at lower prices in many countries due to market competition.

Dial-up requires time to establish a usable telephone connection (several seconds, depending on the location) and perform handshaking In information technology, telecommunications, and related fields, handshaking is an automated process of negotiation that dynamically sets parameters of a communications channel established between two entities before normal communication over the channel begins. It follows the physical establishment of the channel and precedes normal information for protocol synchronization before data transfers can take place. In locales with telephone connection charges, each connection incurs an incremental cost. If calls are time-metered, the duration of the connection incurs costs. Dial-up access is a transient connection, because either the user or the ISP terminates the connection. Internet service providers will often set a limit on connection durations to prevent hogging of access, and will disconnect the user — requiring reconnection and the costs and delays associated with it. Technically-inclined users often find a way to disable the auto-disconnect program such that they can remain connected for days. This is particularly useful for downloading large files such as videos.

A 2008 Pew Internet and American Life Project The Pew Research Center is an American think tank organization based in Washington, D.C. that provides information on issues, attitudes and trends shaping the United States and the world. The Center and its projects receive funding from The Pew Charitable Trusts. The Pew Research Center is a strictly non-advocacy organization, while the Pew study states that only 10 percent of American adults still use dial-up Internet access. Reasons for retaining dial-up access span from lack of infrastructure to high broadband prices.^[2]

Performance

Modern dial-up modems typically have a maximum theoretical transfer speed of 56 kbit/s In telecommunications, bit rate or data transfer rate is the average number of bits, characters, or blocks per unit time passing between equipment in a data transmission system. This is typically measured in multiples of the units bit per second or byte per second (using the V.90 The ITU-T V-Series Recommendations on Data communication over the telephone network specify the protocols that govern approved modem communication standards and interfaces or V.92 V.92 is an ITU-T recommendation, titled Enhancements to Recommendation V.90, that establishes a modem standard allowing near 56 kbit/s download and 48 kbit/s upload rates. With V.92 PCM is used for both the upstream and downstream connections; previously 56K modems only used PCM for downstream data protocol In the field of telecommunications, a communications protocol is the set of standard rules for data representation, signaling, authentication and error detection required to send information over a communications channel. An example of a simple communications protocol adapted to voice communication is the case of a radio dispatcher talking to), although in most cases 40-50 kbit/s is the norm. Factors such as phone line noise In science, and especially in physics and telecommunication, noise is fluctuations in and the addition of external factors to the stream of target information being received at a detector. In communications, it may be deliberate as for instance jamming of a radio or TV signal, but in most cases it is assumed to be merely undesired interference as well as the quality of the modem itself play a large part in determining connection speeds. Some connections may be as low as 20 kbit/s in extremely "noisy" environments, such as in a hotel room where the phone line is shared with many extensions. Other things such as long loops, loading coils In electronics, a loading coil or load coil is a coil that does not provide coupling to any other circuit, but is inserted in a circuit to increase its inductance. The need was discovered by Oliver Heaviside in studying the disappointing slow speed of the Transatlantic telegraph cable. He concluded additional inductance was required to prevent, pair gain In telephony, pair gain is a method of transmitting multiple POTS signals over the twisted pairs traditionally used for a single traditional subscriber line in telephone systems. Pair gain has the effect of creating additional subscriber lines. This is typically used as an expedient way to solve subscriber line shortage problems by using existing, and digital loop carriers A digital loop carrier is a system which uses digital transmission to extend the range of the local loop farther than would be possible using only twisted pair copper wires. A DLC digitizes and multiplexes the individual signals carried by the local loops onto a single datastream on the DLC segment can also cripple connections to 20 kbit/s or lower.

Dial-up connections usually have latency Latency in a packet-switched network is measured either one-way , or round-trip (the one-way latency from source to destination plus the one-way latency from the destination back to the source). Round-trip latency is more often quoted, because it can be measured from a single point. Note that round trip latency excludes the amount of time that a as high as 400 ms or even more, which can make online gaming An online game is a game played over some form of computer network. This almost always means the Internet or equivalent technology; but games have always used whatever technology was current: modems before the Internet, and hard wired terminals before modems. The expansion of online gaming has reflected the overall expansion of computer networks or video conferencing A videoconference or video conference is a set of interactive telecommunication technologies which allow two or more locations to interact via two-way video and audio transmissions simultaneously. It has also been called 'visual collaboration' and is a type of groupware difficult, if not impossible. First person shooter style games are the most sensitive to latency, making playing them impractical on dial-up. However, some games such as Everquest EverQuest, often shortened to EQ, is a 3D fantasy-themed massively multiplayer online role-playing game that was released on the 16th of March, 1999. The original design is credited to Brad McQuaid, Steve Clover, and Bill Trost. It was developed by Sony's 989 Studios and its early-1999 spin-off Verant Interactive. It was published by Sony Online, Red Faction Red Faction is a first-person shooter video game that was released in 2001 for the PlayStation 2, Microsoft Windows, and Macintosh by THQ and Volition. A version for the Nokia N-Gage was developed by Monkeystone Games. The game was also re-developed as a top-down shooter for the mobile phone, Star Wars: Galaxies Star Wars Galaxies is a Star Wars themed MMORPG for Microsoft Windows developed by Sony Online Entertainment and published by LucasArts, The Sims Online EA-Land was a massively multiplayer online game (MMOG) variation on Maxis' highly popular computer game The Sims. It was published by Electronic Arts and released on December 17, 2002 for Microsoft Windows. In March 2007, EA announced that the product would be re-branded as EA-Land and major enhancements would be made. About a year later,, Warcraft 3 Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos is a real-time strategy computer game released by Blizzard Entertainment on July 3, 2002 (US). It is the second sequel to Warcraft: Orcs & Humans, and it is the third game set in the Warcraft Universe. An expansion pack, The Frozen Throne, was released on July 1, 2003 (US), Final Fantasy XI Final Fantasy XI , also known as Final Fantasy XI Online, is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) developed and published by Square (later Square Enix) as part of the Final Fantasy series. It was released in Japan on Sony's PlayStation 2 on May 16, 2002, and was released for Microsoft's Windows-based personal computers in, Guild Wars Guild Wars is an episodic series of online role-playing games developed by ArenaNet and published by NCsoft. Although often defined as an MMORPG, the developers define it as a CORPG due to notable differences from the MMORPG genre. It provides two main modes of gameplay—a cooperative role-playing component and a competitive player vs. player, Unreal Tournament Unreal Tournament is a first-person shooter video game co-developed by Epic Games and Digital Extremes. It was published in 1999 by GT Interactive. Retrospectively, the game has also been referred to as UT99 or UT Classic to differentiate it from its numbered sequels. The game is based on the same technology that powered Unreal, but the design of, Halo: Combat Evolved Halo: Combat Evolved is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie. The first game of the Halo series, it was released on November 15, 2001 as a launch title for the Xbox gaming system, and is considered the platform's "killer app." With more than five million copies sold worldwide as of November 9, 2005, Microsoft released, and Audition Audition Online , also known as X-BEAT in Japan, is a downloadable multiplayer online casual rhythm game produced by T3 Entertainment. It was originally released in South Korea in 2004, but it has been localized by various publishers around the world. Audition Online is free to play but it earns its revenue by selling virtual items such as clothes are capable of running on 56k dial-up. Many modern video games do not even include the option to use dial up anymore.

An increasing amount of Internet content such as streaming media Streaming media are multimedia that are constantly received by, and normally presented to, an end-user while being delivered by a streaming provider . The name refers to the delivery method of the medium rather than to the medium itself. The distinction is usually applied to media that are distributed over telecommunications networks, as most will not work at dialup speeds.

Analog telephone lines are digitally switched and transported inside a Digital Signal 0 once reaching the telephone company's equipment. Digital Signal 0 is 64 kbit/s, therefore a 56 kbit/s connection is the highest that will ever be possible with analog phone lines.

Using compression to exceed 56k

The V.42 The ITU-T V-Series Recommendations on Data communication over the telephone network specify the protocols that govern approved modem communication standards and interfaces, V.42bis The ITU-T V-Series Recommendations on Data communication over the telephone network specify the protocols that govern approved modem communication standards and interfaces and V.44 The ITU-T V-Series Recommendations on Data communication over the telephone network specify the protocols that govern approved modem communication standards and interfaces standards allow modems to accept uncompressed data at a rate faster than the line rate. These algorithms use data compression to achieve higher throughput.

For instance, a 53.3 kbit/s connection with V.44 can transmit up to 53.3 * 6 == 320 kbit/s if the offered data stream can be compressed that much. However, the compressibility of data tends to vary continuously, for example, due to the transfer of already-compressed files (ZIP files, JPEG images, MP3 audio, MPEG video).^[3] A modem might be sending compressed files at approximately 50 kbit/s, uncompressed files at 160 kbit/s, and pure text at 320 kbit/s, or any rate in this range.^[4]

Performance assessment

Many modems were manufactured as independent communications devices connected to the computer via a RS-232 In telecommunications, RS-232 is a standard for serial binary single-ended data and control signals connecting between a DTE (Data Terminal Equipment) and a DCE (Data Circuit-terminating Equipment). It is commonly used in computer serial ports. The standard defines the electrical characteristics and timing of signals, the meaning of signals, and cable. Modems are capable of independently managing the connection and monitoring signal quality, and can adjust the data rate as line conditions change.

In analog serial communications modems, once the connection is established, the data communications session consumes all available bandwidth.^{[citation needed]} Often there is no backchannel Backchannel is the practice of using networked computers to maintain a real-time online conversation alongside live spoken remarks. The term was coined in the field of Linguistics to describe listeners' behaviours during verbal communication, Victor Yngve 1970 capacity for the modem to communicate connection status to the end user or local computer.^{[citation needed]} During the connection negotiation phase, modems transmit the connection speed to the attached computer in status reports. If the base data rate changes at a later time, there is no way to indicate this change to the local computer during the data communications session.^{[citation needed]}

Although much more capable serial communications such as USB Universal Serial Bus is a specification to establish communication between devices and a host controller (usually personal computers), developed and invented by Ajay Bhatt while working for Intel. USB is intended to replace many varieties of serial and parallel ports. USB can connect computer peripherals such as mice, keyboards, digital cameras, are now used, and in approximately 1992 the soft modem was developed that uses the internal computer CPU to handle modem communications, there is still no defined industry standard backchannel method available to indicate status information such as the current base rate and actual compression ratio, to the user of the local computer.

Compression by the ISP

As telephone-based 56 kbit/s modems 56k modems are voiceband modems nominally capable of download speeds up to 56 kbit/s . At the beginning of the 21st Century, most personal computers contained one, their use declining as broadband technologies such as DSL gain wider availability began losing popularity, some Internet Service Providers such as Netzero NetZero is an Internet service provider based in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California. It is a subsidiary of United Online, owner of Juno Online Services and BlueLight Internet Services. The current chairman, president, and CEO of United Online (and thus NetZero) is Mark Goldston, TOAST.net, and Earthlink EarthLink , is an Internet service provider (ISP) headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. It claims 5.4 million members (2004 estimate)[citation needed] started using pre-compression to increase the throughput and maintain their customer base. As an example, Netscape Netscape Communications is a US computer services company, best known for its web browser. When it was an independent company, its headquarters were in Mountain View, California. The name Netscape was a trademark of Cisco Systems, that was granted to the company ISP uses a compression program that squeezes images, text, and other objects at the server, just prior to sending them across the phone line. The server-side compression operates much more efficiently than the "on-the-fly" compression of V.44-enabled modems. Typically website text is compacted to 5% thus increasing effective throughput to approximately 1000 kbit/s, and images are lossy-compressed to 15-20% increasing throughput to about 350 kbit/s.

The drawback of this approach is a loss in quality, where the graphics acquire more compression artifacts taking-on a blurry appearance, however the speed is dramatically improved and the user can manually choose to view the uncompressed images at any time. The ISPs employing this approach advertise it as "DSL speeds over regular phone lines" or simply "high speed dialup".

Replacement by broadband

Broadband Internet access (cable and DSL) has been replacing dial-up access in many parts of the world. Broadband connections typically offer speeds 700 kbit/s or higher for approximately the same price as dialup.

However, many areas still remain without high speed Internet despite the eagerness of potential customers. This can be attributed to population, location, or sometimes ISPs' lack of interest due to little chance of profitability and high costs to build the required infrastructure. Some Dialup ISPs have responded to the increased competition by lowering their rates and making dialup an attractive option for those who merely want email access or basic web browsing.^[5][6]

Recession and its effect on service

News reports in 2009 have noted a resurgence of dial-up access in the U.S. resulting from a recessionary economy, as a more affordable way of accessing the internet.^[7][8][9] For example, the lowest cost dialup is approximately $7–8 per month, whereas the lowest cost DSL and Cable are about $18 (Verizondsl.com) and $45–55 (Comcast.com) per month.

Certainly high-speed DSL and Cable are available without local phone service, but the cost of this "naked" service is noticeably higher. AT&T offers basic DSL ("Direct Express") without a phone line for $35/month,^[10] potentially negating any savings from canceling the phone service. Cable companies do not financially penalize a subscriber for not having a local phone, however cable internet services are usually more expensive if the customer does not subscribe to their television services.

List of dialup speeds

Note that the values given are maximum values, and actual values may be slower under certain conditions (for example, noisy phone lines).^[11]

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