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First, The Basics

Part 1 of this guide outlines some of the more basic things you should look for in your setup. Beginners will find these simple hints invaluable.

By Joe Ebner
WebNovice.com

Sometimes you just can't win. You dial into your service provider, log on to the 'Net, and wait....and wait....and wait some more. It seems to take forever to display a Web page. What's wrong?

It may be nothing more than a "wrong place at the wrong time" syndrome or a line to your ISP that is just a little noisey. When your connection seems to be running a little slow you might be able to cure it with these simple tricks.

Dial in when traffic is light

Just like the freeways leading into and out of any large city, the Internet too has it's rush hours. And, as it is with real-world, virtual traffic jambs can slow the Web to a crawl.

So, common sense indicates if you want to download a large file or do other data heavy work on the Internet, you'll get it done faster if you schedule them during off-peak times. It goes without saying that, generally, the very early morning hours are the best times to work the 'Net.

There's even a Web site that details traffic flow on the Internet at any given time. Use the information presented to judge for yourself when the best times are for you to log on.

Noisy Lines

Sometimes when you dial in to your ISP you just might make your connection through a noisy phone line or TELCO switch. When your modem connects under these conditions it has a difficult time dealing with it.

While it will try its best to work correctly, sometimes data will become garbled or pieces of it will be lost. Your modem, along with the communications software running at the time, will keep asking for the data to be re-sent. This means time consuming and frustrating delays for you.

In either case your modem can respond by either shifting to a slower speed or simply give up -- dropping your connection.

The cure? Try logging off and re-dialing. You may luck out and get a cleaner connection the second time.

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