*BSD News Article 85635


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From: Ken Bigelow <kbigelow@www.play-hookey.com>
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: Apache and FreeBSD versions
Date: Wed, 25 Dec 1996 13:22:52 +0000
Organization: Erol's Internet Services
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Message-ID: <32C12AAC.D2D@www.play-hookey.com>
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Dan Foster wrote:
> 
> In article <32BF5674.2D0F@fred.net>, Roger Armstrong  <mcurry@fred.net> wrote:
> >Ken Bigelow wrote:
> >> As for Squid, I've seen references to both it and CERN cache in my
> >> agent_log file, but I haven't tried it, and so have no opinion. I figure
> >> that my 33.6K dialup is the basic bottleneck on my system. Until I can
> >> upgrade that to at least ISDN, any efforts I make to speed up the box
> >> will have little practical effect.
> 
> It might help you, even on a relatively 'low speed' net connection because
> it becomes 'smarter' through caching and other optimizing technology, so
> you don't have to clog as much of your pipe to the net with redundant data.
> However, how much of a potential win this would be for you, I don't know.
> Evaluation would probably give you your answer. Although, yes, I'll concede
> that you can go ever so far before you run into that brick wall called
> bandwidth...

The eternal brick wall, indeed. But maybe I'm missing something here. My
connection to my ISP is via 33.6K dialup, with some compression. In my
logical fashion, I reason that if I cache my pages on my own server,
they still have to go through that narrow pipe, for no net benefit.
However, if my ISP caches my pages on *their* side of the pipe, this
bottleneck would be avoided.

I could also believe some improvement if my gateway box was not also my
Web server. Then I could cache pages on the gateway and avoid having too
much traffic on my local Ethernet. However, since my Web server *is* my
gateway as well, I see no advantage in this case.

Am I still missing something?

> 
> >USR says they will make x2 firmware available to new purchasers of their
> >modem lines, sometime in Jan. or Feb.  Assuming that you seek out an ISP
> 
> X2 is still a very much beta product. One of the nation's top 10 long
> distance telco company's subsidiary - their ISP, doesn't even have the
> X2 software in hand yet! What you are hearing is the marketing hype
> USR is making. No offense intended to USR - I love the products, I like
> the company... but I recognize marketing hype for what it is when I see it.
> 
> >that uses USR modems for dialups, this could move you up to 56K.
> 
> I have contacts with a large telco and various people, and my info is *very*
> preliminary (ie I have yet to do much more reading), so keep that in mind.
> 
> What I've heard:
> X2 is nice, but not necessarily a panacea. Why? For one thing, it's
> isosynchronous (ie 56k down, 33k up, or something to that effect). And
> then it requires that switches between your serving CO and the CO that
> serves the ISP is pure digital. There are a bunch of older analog
> switches still out there.
> 
> And then there is the matter of industry acceptance of the format used
> for X2. USR has their own..Rockwell, Motorola, Lucent et al are all
> playing with something else. Then the ITU-T is waiting for submissions
> from those companies - but they could always reject it in favor of something
> else. Why is this important? Anybody remember USR's HST format before
> v.32 was standardized? :)
> 
> Then there are some lawsuits pending that may affect the final outcome.
> And so on. IOW.. lots still remains to be fleshed out before X2 can
> truly be called a standardized technology in any form.
> 
> X2 might be called more of a very temporary stopgap measure? Technology
> to watch out would be ADSL... or the offerings from various cable
> companies (again, their offerings are isosynchronous, too - but at least
> bigger pipe overall than with X2).
> 
> >On the other hand, Bell Atlantic is thrashing the ISDN waters pretty
> >hard. They are now waiving the $125 installation charge.  This could put
> >you in a position where you could 1. find an ISP that would or could
> >execute the ISDN dialup to your Web site for inbound calls (seems
> >unlikely), or 2. plunge ahead and get the centrex ISDN.  Maybe BellAtl
> >has a pop reasonably close-by, and your mileage charges for centrex may
> >be acceptable.
> 
> Hmm. Mileage-based charges rather than per-minute charges? Hmm, interesting.
> How would the two compare (ie CTX ISDN and mileage-based charges vs typical
> residential ISDN offering and per-minute charges), any ideas? (Very curious
> now ;-) )

I can only tell you that we recently installed 128K ISDN at work. The
office is in Northwest DC and the ISP we use is in Alexandria, VA. I
understand the charge is about $600 per month. However, if I go with an
ISP closer to me, I may get it down to $200/mo. After Christmas I'll be
checking the possibilities with a couple of local ISPs.


Cheers, and Happy Holidays to all!
-- 
Ken

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