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From: Paul Richards <paul@netcraft.co.uk>
Message-Id: <199508141536.QAA03309@server.netcraft.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Netware gateway.
To: gary@palmer.demon.co.uk (Gary Palmer)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 1995 16:36:55 +0100 (BST)
Cc: paul@freebsd.org, terry@cs.weber.edu, questions@freebsd.org
In-Reply-To: <1791.808413120@palmer.demon.co.uk> from "Gary Palmer" at Aug 14, 95 04:12:00 pm
Reply-to: paul@freebsd.org
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In reply to Gary Palmer who said
> 
> >A 128Kb link from Pipex is $60,000 !!! You've got no chance of
> >getting a class C address unless you get a leased line. It's
> >basically accepted here now that if you get a dial-up connection
> >you'll be allocated nothing more than a single ip address.
> 
> I went and re-read my stuff, Demon charge #1,000 setup and #600/month
> for a 64k leased line. Trouble is, unless you are accessing a LOT of
> UK based services (for which we have a relatively good link to
> ja.net), it's probably better going with another ISP. I think Pipex
> have something like 4 T1's going across the pond now.
> 
> >BT, the only telcom big enough to really service the internet here
> >has a stranglehold on leased lines, a 64Kb leased line is $9000 to
> >rent, that's just the physical cable. You have to pay an ISP for
> >the internet service on top of that.
> 
> Yes, but Energis and Mercury both do leased lines, and somewhat
> cheaper than BT from what I hear.

I tried both Energis and Mercury and neither provided leased lines.
Energis are only a long-haul provider, you still have to get a BT
dedicated line installed at each end to the BT exchange. Mercury
didn't know what I was talking about, maybe they've got better
sales staff now.

Demon's leased line prices are actually not too bad, they weren't
offering leased lines when I looked into it in January. They're
having enough problems dealing with dial-up traffic though and I
wouldn't trust a heavily loaded commercial line to them. For our
particular case we want good connectivity to us from everywhere,
rather than needing to connect out to specific places, so a good
backbone is important.

I wish Janet would get their act together and start offering commercial
services (150 Mbit backbone, comapared to 1 or 2Mb by most commercial
providers).


-- 
  Paul Richards, Bluebird Computer Systems. FreeBSD core team member. 
  Internet: paul@FreeBSD.org, http://www.freebsd.org/~paul
  Phone: 0370 462071 (Mobile), +44 1222 457651 (home)