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Desperately Seeking an ISP

To get connected using a dial-up modem, you have to successfully hook up a modem to your computer and then find a good Internet Service Provider (ISP) to dial up to. Odds are that you have an internal modem that came installed with your computer. If you don’t, you may want to consider upgrading. Check out Upgrading & Fixing PCs For Dummies, 6th Edition, by Andy Rathbone (Wiley Publishing, Inc.).

TipThe best way to find a good ISP is by word of mouth. Getting personal recommendations is a good way to find out both the good and bad points of an ISP that you can’t find from reading advertisements. Before you sign on with an ISP, make sure that the company supports Linux.

If you don’t have any friends and your acquaintances don’t speak to you, try finding a local Linux user group (LUG) to ask. You can look up LUGs at the Red Hat community Web page at www.redhat.com/apps/community.

Table 5-1 shows a sample of ISPs that support Linux.

Whichever one you want to use, make sure to ask your potential new ISP whether it offers a dial-up PPP service. PPP (which stands for point-to-point protocol) is what Linux uses to connect to the Internet. If the person you talk to gives you the verbal equivalent of a blank stare, you may have troubles. If you encounter some kind of a hitch, be forewarned. The ISP’s tech staff probably can’t walk you through the procedures. You’re on your own.

Dial-up modems are an old technology, but still the most common method for making personal or small-business Internet connections. This statement may not be true much longer because the number of users with broadband connections is rising fast, and most large businesses also use broadband services.

An internal modem plugs into a PCI or ISA slot on your computer’s motherboard and receives power from the computer. An external modem comes in its own enclosure, requires its own power supply (those clunky, boxy plugs), and connects to the computer via a serial (RS232) connection. Both types of modems use your phone jack to connect to the Internet.

Internal modems are generally less expensive than external ones, but external modems have several advantages. You can easily turn them on and off, you can connect them to a computer without opening the computer case, and if your telephone line is struck by lightning, the charge passing through the modem doesn’t damage your computer. On the other hand, internal modems need only a telephone line cable, whereas external modems require a telephone line, a serial connection, and power-supply cables.

A third type of serial line modem is a PCMCIA card (sometimes called a PC card). These cards are used most often with laptop computers. Most modern laptops come with internal modems already installed.

WarningNow is a good time to verify that your own telephone service is billed at a flat rate and not metered; you should make sure that the dial-up number you use isn’t a long-distance call either. If you have metered service or end up making a long-distance toll call, you run up huge phone bills while you’re spending hours chatting about lone gunmen and reading about interdimensional space travelers.

After you choose your Internet Service Provider and arrange payment, the ISP provides certain pieces of information, including

Telephone access numbers

A username (usually the one you want)

A password (usually the one you supply)

An e-mail address typically, your username added to the ISP’s domain name

A primary Domain Name Server (DNS) number, which is a large number separated by periods into four groups of digits

A secondary Domain Name Server (DNS) number, which is another large number separated by periods into four groups of digits

An SMTP (mail) server name

An NNTP (news) server name

A POP3 or IMAP server name, used to download e-mail from the ISP’s server to your machine

TipAccess4Free provides a nice combination of free and subscription Internet service. After you register, you get your first 10 hours of service per month free. You’re charged on an hourly basis up to $9.95 over 10 hours. You can also subscribe for unlimited dial-up access for $9.95 per month; subscribing gives you telephone support (866-693-7334) that costs $5 per call otherwise. (That’s not bad either!) Access4Free also provides local dial-up and PPP access in many U.S. cities.

WarningWhen you’re shopping for a new modem, avoid WinModems like dot.com stock because these modems are designed for only Windows computers. They’re cheaper than regular modems because they’re lazy (or smart, depending on how you look at it) and depend on the Windows operating system to do much of their work for them. Linux drivers are only now beginning to appear for these types of modems. See the preceding sidebar, “If you’re buying a modem,” for more information about purchasing a modem for your Red Hat Linux computer.