No more dialup for me! I am coming to you live via satellite! Actually, it's been a huge trial to get it working, and it's still got some serious issues, like how it pops up my "Connect to dial-up?" message every 30 seconds or so. That's actually a new problem, and most of the other problems disappeared when it arrived, so I kind of like it. Guild Wars won't start up at all, and I have been chatting with their tech support about it. But from what I see/hear, it won't matter. I have a ping of around 1500 on average, which means, for those who are not online gaming savvy, that it takes 1.5 seconds for data to get from my computer to a server and back. Think about it - you hit the button, and 1.5 seconds later, your guy shoots. Not too good. Even dial-up usually gets you about a 300 ping most of the time. That latency is kind of icky on the web and email too, actually, but it still blows away dial-up for the web and downloading because of how fast it goes once it does get the command across. It downloads far more than 10x as fast, and we're using the cheapest/slowest package available.
Anyway, in case you were wondering, satellite is the last refuge for us people out in the boonies who can't get DSL or cable. Nobody would recommend it over those options, ever. But when it's that or dial-up, satellite wins... mostly. Dial-up is still plainly superior for gaming, and a lot of satellite users actually dial in to play games. Not me though! We're getting rid of the land line, since it has no purpose
but dial-up, and we'll save almost as much as the satellite costs by canceling it. I miss video games.
But satellite is going to be alright. It does mean always on, no phone involved (except the computer randomly asking to have dial-up back for no reason), and a wireless network in the house - so the Wii is online! I downloaded Super Mario Bros.! And I am typing this from the floor of the living room. I've also been enjoying the wonders of Youtube videos, which load up faster than they play, a miracle to my belagged eyes.
