Word: modem
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...Diego is no computer geek--she designs and knits sweaters for a living--but when she ordered broadband Internet access, she thought she had done her homework. She talked to her friends and the employees at a local CompUSA store to figure out which kind of service--cable modem, digital subscriber line or satellite--made the most sense. But when she finally made the call, she was plunged into a netherworld of bureaucracy. Charges appeared on her phone bill even before she had officially ordered DSL, just for having asked about it. The company from which she ordered...
Finally, in the Microsoft Conspiracy Department, a number of programs did not work--from Microsoft's competitors. My AOL connection refused to recognize my cable modem and tried to connect via the phone, something Microsoft says AOL will "fix" in its forthcoming 7.0 release. Liquid Audio, a popular music player, had the dubious distinction of causing my machine to gag. And Java programs now require you to find, download and install a special piece of software. Oh, well. Life's not perfect under a monopoly. Better get used...
...link peripheral devices, such as PDAs and printers, to other computerized devices. Chips up to 30 ft. apart built on the new standard can exchange audio and data at a rate of 500 to 1,000 kilobytes every second--more than 10 times as fast as your dial-up modem...
...transmits data 10 times that distance and at much more than 100 times the rate of a dial-up modem, making it an ideal technology for linking computers to one another and to the Net in a wireless local-area network, or WLAN. It also has the advantage of being unequivocally here and relatively easy to use. All you need is a specialized PC card (for as low as $90) that slips into a slot in your computer, and an access point or base station (available for less than $300) capable of linking several computers. The downside? Higher power means...
...Internet Explorer on a PC, the Pop-Up Stopper from PanicWare (at panicware.com is a simple pleasure. Even if you've never downloaded software before, it's worth a try. Using a regular modem, the download and installation take less than 10 minutes. Then, every time Stopper detects an offending ad, it buzzes like one of those fly zappers, and you will never see what you're missing...