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Modem Accelerators?
An Anonymous Coward asks: "I was browsing on the web and came across a reference to Coastal Web Online's claim of a modem accelerator Apparently it is a service which is supposed to make your modem 3x faster. Is this possible? I've already got a v.92 modem and I thought it already did compression. It is possible it is a proxy doing some compression on white space in HTML or something, but I don't think so, since it apparently only works with Windows 9x and Internet Exploder. For $8.00 a month ontop a the dialup access sounds kinda snake oilish. Does anybody on Slashdot use the service? Would they recommend it? This sounds remarkably similar to the old idea of 'waxing your modem'. Am I missing out on something here?"
There is nothing snake oilish about these compression claims. Only a few ISPs are supporting it, but the v.42 compression standard has been out for a while. Check out this comparison to see how it differs from older compression standards. The key is that these claimed ratios are in ideal situations -- ie, when you're downloading a great deal of text, not the high-bandwidth consuming images or video streams. Those are already highly compressed, and so are unlikely to benefit from further compression. In fact, it is a fairly trivial consequence that any compression method will make some kinds of files larger, not smaller. A fatter pipe is the only solution sometimes, and that just isn't going to happen with POTS.
Ceci n'est pas un post
They do have technical documentation don't they?
If the service isn't 'snake oil' then it should be possible for them to explain in a reasonable way how the service work, what part of what your modem does that it accelerates.
Me, I'm betting they don't - not that I'm going to bother hitting their site to find out since I ain't someone that cares about modems any longer.
From The Site:
How does the 3XS system work?
We send you a CD ROM with your side of the program to load on your computer (a 5 minute process). At our network headquarters, we filter you through our Accelerator Server.
Once you have installed our 3XS software, even on a trial basis, you can click on and off the ICON to see the difference in downloading web pages, and transferring e-mail attachments on your computer.
From this I would have to think it is a data compression by proxy server system that uncompresses on the user side, they offer a 7 day trial, if your really curious I suggest trying it.
iRepairIT - iPhone, Mac, & PC Repair
Web accelerators are bunko. While there are a few tricks one can pull to get the most out of their internet connection you're not going to make it magically 3x faster by any means. Optimizing MTU settings and using some HTTP tricks to max out your available bandwidth might garner you a kilobyte every once in a while nobody is going to able to give you a 3x increase on your POTS modem. If you want an apparent speed increase either beef up the disk space allocated to your browser's cache. You can also find download accelerators that will use multiple simulteneous HTTP connections to the same server for the same file and with the packets arriving out of order the accelerator combines them into a single contiguous file. It is nowhere near a 3x increase though.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
The best thing I ever did for my modem users, was to install mod_gzip, which compresses every page (be that HTML or any dynamically generated PHP page) apache sends out.
Result? Up to 92% compression! My pages are loading so much faster than before, AND I am saving on my bandwidth bill.
Installation is a breeze, the mod is a beauty.
- the mod_gzip project
- scoop article on mod_gzip
- some stats for intune.org
Hurra for Knark!
Even if this was possible, compressing text files, or removing whitespace from HTML, latency wouldn't change. In many situations, latency is more of a concern as simple "speed". If you're using Emacs over SSH for example, each character that is typed needs at least the minimum ping time to be displayed, regardless of compression.
about speed should just buy something more advanced.
Even isdn can be very nice after a modem.
This must be some pretty kooky compression scheme that it can only work with one brand of browser.
We send you a CD ROM with your side of the program to load on your computer (a 5 minute process).
Is this the new FedEx super-express delivery I've been hearing about? How much does it cost?
You can accomplish anything you set your mind to. The impossible just takes a little longer.
it might work a bit like this open source software.
Recompress jpegs with higher compression, remove banner ads. Gzip the remaining page and hey presto faster download, though of course that doesnt need any client side software apart from a browser that will accept gzip compression (most do).
I guess these guys are using some proprietary or obscured format for their compression, to help them cash in.
Not much use to those on fast connections but for a modem user the time taken to encode/decode may be faster than downloading the normal pages.
no sig.
I've been toying with setting up a compressed SSH stream to my webserver and installing Squid on that. I server a few small sites so Processing power is not a big deal. I'm not too sure that SSH will help me much. I've already installed a local Squid server and I block ads, that helps a bunch. I'd love to get more Idea's.
-- Tim
TKrabec Pahh
All of you people who are putting so much thought into analyzing the possibilities about what this could be are making me laugh. New form of compression? Hahaha. That's a good one.
It's just a caching server folks.
Move along, nothing to see here.
In order for your modem to receive the data in a compressed format, whatever is sending the data has to compress it using the same algorithm. Thus mod_gzip works. But it will only work on things that are compressible in the first place. Will your mp3s come down the pipe any faster? Of course not. Compressing a compressed file with a different algorithm will get you minimal gains. The short answer: no, other than tweaking the packets a bit (ie MTU, etc), you can't 'accellerate' your downloads.
I do, and I like it.
I've had one-way cable, ADSL, and two-way cable. The new house does not have broadband, and there's no planned arrival date from either the cable company (AT&T) or Bellsouth. I can get ISDN, which is about twice as fast as what I currently have, for a ridiculous amount. Or I can get satellite, which is $70 a month but installation is almost $1,000.
So any way to increase my current speed is welcomed, and their service does the trick. I haven't measured it with a stopwatch, but the pages load faster.
The service I'm using is ProxyConn .
They offer a free week trial, so if you're really interested in the service, give it a try!
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
http://www.quickcat.com
We co-brand this stuff too. It works, but it's not mind-blowing technology.
There are cable modem standards called DOCSIS. Not all modems follow these standards. For the modulation demodulation part have a look at the RF specification starting at section 4 on page 23. Upstream uses QPSK or 16QAM, downstream uses 64QAM or 256QAM. I believe that for a given number of homes there will be one downstream signal, but multiple upstream signals. (the number of upstreams would probably not equal the number of homes.)
For the hardcore RF geeks these specs are a great read. You can see how these specs were designed as opposed to "happened."
ProxyConn's homepage brags that it "Works with all browsers / operating systems!".
However, if you dig a little deeper into their "Technology" page, you find that it works with any MS-Windows OS and only IE and Netscape browsers.
Never forget to read the fine print!!
Hey, who else could go for some flapjacks right now?
See subject. POTS is reborn with DSL.