03.28.08
If you can believe it…
…we still don’t have “real” Internet up here.
However, we have gotten better with the fake Internet than I think we could’ve possibly imagined. It all began with replacing the P.O.S. (code for “ultimately inadequate”) Kyocera KR-1 router with (of all things) a Mac Mini running OS X 10.5 (”Leopard”). Our uptimes went from minutes between reboots to literally days and days between network disconnects. Add in that the Mini doesn’t need to be restarted pretty much ever, and it’s the best $600 I’ve ever spent.
It cleared up all the difficulties I had with VPN into work, it’s perceptibly faster than with the KR-1, and it damn near never disconnects, no matter how hard I pound the connection. Suddenly, YouTube was not a ridiculous notion. I even managed to download a rental movie from iTunes over the connection. I won’t say that I’m thrilled with the throughput. But hey, the fact that I can run BitTorrent fills my heart with peace, such that I feel no desire to run BitTorrent.
Sometimes, just being able to do something allows you to let go of the desire to do it. Other times, you probably go ahead and binge on downloading DVD sized ISO images.