The type of connection that is required to use the applications that are causing the majority of the media attention lately are a step above the typical dial-up terminal connection. They are known as SLIP or PPP and by using one of these pieces of communications software your computer at home or work becomes directly connected to the Internet. You can then use your favorite graphical user interface (GUI) to browse the multimedia World Wide Web (WWW) and start other client programs like e-mail, newsreaders, Gopher, plus all the others you’ve been reading about.
However, GUIs and direct connections also require a step above the base hardware of the typical home or office computer. But before you groan too loud, keep in mind that most of this is necessary just to run the newest generations of word processors and games that we’ve all become accustomed to. It’s not just the Internet, so you may already have quite a bit of it.
Don’t skimp on the graphics card either if you’re in the MS-Windows camp. Get one with Windows graphics primitives built in to the hardware, and at least 1 megabyte of video memory so you can use an 800x600 resolution with 256 colors. Browsing the Web will then be a pleasurable experience.
On the subject of memory, make sure your Mac or clone has at least 8 megabytes of RAM. It is true that a system will run with only 4 megs, but run is too strong a word, limp along is closer to reality. You must also constrain yourself to only having a few applications at a time open. If it fits in your budget, go for 16 megs of main memory.
The type of disk drives you need in a computer system is changing again. A 3 ½” floppy, double speed CD-ROM drive, and 340 megabyte hard drive are about the minimum, although with prices of 1 gigabyte drives hovering around $500, if it’s update or new system time have one installed. With all the information available on the Internet, you can fill one of those big disks up quicker than you think if you’re not careful.
Now that you have a CD-ROM drive in your system, if you have a MS-Windows based machine, you’ll need the other half of the multimedia components necessary to take full advantage of the WWW, and this is a sound card and speakers. 16-bit sound cards are available for under $100, and speakers can be had for $20-$500 depending on how serious an audiophile you are.
If a complete multimedia upgrade is in order, kits that contain a double-speed CD-ROM drive, sound card, speakers, joystick, and anywhere from 3 to over a dozen CD-ROM titles are available for under $400. A complete kit also has the advantage of insuring the controller card for the drive is compatible with the sound card, simplifying setup.
The most important hardware section for Internet use though are the communications components. These consist of two parts, the modem and the serial port.
The modem is the device that translates the information on your computer into a signal the telephone company’s equipment can understand using a plain old voice type telephone line. Modems are rated by the speed at which they can translate and transfer digital information, with the current standard being 14.4 Kbps, which means thousands of bits per second. This is also known as the bandwidth, and the current high-end standard is 28.8 Kbps.
14.4 fax-modems (you can’t get modems anymore without fax capability) are going for less than $100, and the 28.8s are 2-3 times as much, but definitely worth the extra money if you’ll be doing a lot of file transfers or web browsing. The question of whether you should get an internal or external modem will lead us into the other half of the communications hardware, the serial (comm) port.
The serial port is a communication channel the computer uses to talk to devices such as modems, mice, and some printers. There are usually at least two serial ports on a computer, and sometimes a standard peripheral like a mouse will use its own dedicated port. On Intel based machines the serial ports can either be on the main system- or mother-board, or on a separate expansion card and are known as COM1 and COM2. Another thing to keep in mind is that each serial port needs to have its own interrupt number and base memory address.
One of the building blocks of a serial port is a chip called a UART. This chip handles receiving and transmitting the data to and from the modem, and the 16550 UART also has data buffers built into the chip. This is a necessity for error-free high-speed communications, which brings us back to the internal/external modem question.
High-speed internal modems have the 16550 UART built onto the modem card. With external modems, the serial port itself must have the 16550. 99% of the systems that have the serial port built onto the motherboard use the older 8450 or 16450 UART which are not adequate for modern high-speed communications. Most of the standard serial port expansion (I/O) cards also use the older chips.
If you install an internal modem in a machine with two existing serial ports, you must disable one of the ports so the modem can use it. Almost all of the Internet communications software for Intel based machines want to use either COM1 or COM2. While it is theoretically possible to use more comm ports on these machines, it’s not recommended for anyone without a good technical background. Usually the mouse will take one comm port and the modem the other.
High-speed modems also generate quite a bit of heat, so in addition to using an expansion slot, an internal modem causes the internal temperature of your computer to increase. An external modem uses its own power supply, so you need to allow for an extra plug, but you also get the advantage of having front panel status lights to monitor some of what is going on with your communications link.
A straightforward upgrade is to simply replace the serial card, or add one after disabling the built-in ports. The high-speed cards for the Intel based machines cost $50-$100 and come with two high-speed serial ports, a parallel printer port, usually a game port (although with a sound card this isn’t necessary), and can also contain the controller for the floppy drives and IDE hard drives.
One last hint for the hardware section. If you use your modem quite a bit, it’s a good idea to get a second phone line installed just for the modem/fax. The rest of your family will thank you, and you won’t have to hassle with disabling call waiting every time you dial out to make your Internet connection.
There are getting to be quite a few options now for Internet software. There are two basic building blocks to the software suite you need. The communication protocol software, which is known as a TCP/IP stack, and the application programs such as Mosaic and an e-mail client. Your first choice is which TCP/IP stack to use.
Your basic choices are between shareware programs where you can pick and choose to build your own set of custom applications to suit your needs, and the commercial packages that try to give you everything at once. The all-in-one solutions are easier to setup, but if you don’t happen to like the telnet client or web browser it is sometimes almost impossible to replace it with a third party program.
In over a year of testing shareware, public domain, and commercial Internet software, I’d estimate that 95% of the shareware and public domain software is more feature rich and more stable than about 75% of the commercial packages. With commercial software part of the purchase price includes support, but from reading the technical USENET newsgroups I get the impression that the shareware products actually get better support and more frequent updates.
In addition to the TCP/IP stack you’ll want to have at least the following client programs for a fully functional setup: an e-mail program which should handle both SMTP and POP mail protocols; a newsreader for the USENET newsgroups which can handle message threading; a World Wide Web browser client like Mosaic or Netscape; and an ftp client that will allow drag-and-drop file transfer.
Most of the web browsers will also act as a client for other Internet services such as e-mail and ftp, but with limited functionality. For serious use, at least for now, stick with the stand-alone applications. Depending on use, one exception to this rule of thumb is for Gopher and WAIS. I think Mosaic is as good a gopher client as any, but HGopher is a nice application itself. If you find yourself using the WAIS features of your web browser fairly frequently it may also be more productive to add a stand-alone WAIS client to your Internet toolkit, and the same applies to archie and telnet.
An Internet Service Provider (ISP) is your connection to the Internet. These businesses have specialized routing equipment that can be loosely compared to the switching equipment of the phone company. They make sure that all the Internet traffic gets routed to the proper destination and your ISP will also assign a unique Internet address, your IP (Internet Protocol) address.
Some of the services offered by most ISPs in addition to the physical connection are a shell account on their public user computer, e-mail storage/forwarding, and access to the USENET newsgroups. They may also offer multi-user games and chat.
All you have to do is provide a name for your computer. Every computer that is connected to the Internet is considered a host, and your IP address must resolve to a fully qualified domain name (FQDN). The FQDN consists of the host and domain name and would look like: mycomputer.company.com where company.com is the domain name of your ISP. This makes it easier for humans to send mail and find sites by the use of mnemonics.
For example, the computer I’m currently writing this article on is named “athene”, so you could send me e-mail by addressing it to dave@athene.past.com which is easier to remember than dave@199.245.182.1. The same can be said for stanford.edu and nasa.gov.
You’re now ready to start some heavy duty net.surfing to find your own version of ‘Best of the Web’. Hopefully you now have a set of specs and the important buzzwords to know to get that initial connection going. Have fun!
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Questions or comments about these Web pages? Send e-mail to
dave@reststop.net