Thursday 21 May 2015

I'm a Dial-Up Survivor

I am back from the wilderness that is dial-up.  My lovely husband, in an effort to save money, reduced our broadband package to 80GB.  This turned out to be a very bad idea.  We reached our limit within ten days and were forced to wait out the rest of the month on dial-up speeds.  Now I realise this is very much a first world problem.  But I wish to whine!  Oh my gosh, how did we ever survive on dial-up?  I could only have one tab open on my browser and certain sites, like Blogger, either refused to open or didn't work properly when they did.  I couldn't even open the Herald app on my iPad.  Forget about those webinars I wanted to view or the little video clips on Facebook.  Even clicking links on Twitter was slow and painful.  The printer didn't work.  My online life ground to a halt. 

When I asked our I.T. guru if it was really that bad when we used to be on dial-up he reminded me that back then you only tended to have one computer.  So you weren't having to compete with the rest of your family's devices for bandwidth.  

How's this for photographic evidence of how addicted our family is to technology?  Why play a game when you can play a game AND watch Youtube at the same time?!



It's a good thing we've got our broadband data back (unlimited now) as we have three or four teenagers coming for a bring-your-own-laptop birthday sleepover on Saturday and I'm not sure dial-up speeds would have been well received! (And why do they call them 'sleepovers' when that is not an accurate term at all?!).

Having 'survived' dial-up I am now marvelling at the speed and ease of broadband.  What a wonderful thing it is!  A beauty to behold!  I have six tabs open, Blogger is working, and the rest of my family is all online.  Peace has been restored.

2 comments:

  1. Haha. That picture looks familiar - I have a teenage son who plays online games with his friends, whilst simultaneously skyping them (on duals screens no less).

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  2. I survived the "sleepover" (time of sleep - 2.30am, under threat of my husband throwing them outside!). Gaming can be very social though can't it, there were five of them set up round the kitchen table, all playing each other and joking around.

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