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The Minnesota Daily

Serving the UMN community since 1900

The Minnesota Daily

Serving the UMN community since 1900

The Minnesota Daily

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University to phase out dial-up service

On Dec. 31, the University Networking and Telecommunications Services department will shut down the University modem pool, a service that provides students, faculty, staff and alumni with dial-up Internet through a land phone line.

The service is accessible anywhere on campus or in the Twin Cities metro area. It’s free for the first 50 hours of use and $4 for every 30 hours thereafter.

Melissa Martyr-Wagner, customer service manager for NTS, said the number of users has declined as people have switched to faster Internet service providers.

“What we are seeing is that people have been dropping like flies,” Martyr-Wagner said.

She said the service has had no more than 280 users per day in the past month. Over the last six months, she said only 3,300 unique users have logged on.

Peak usage numbered more than 15,000 users “years ago,” she said.

Psychology sophomore Billy Lee said he was unaware the University had a modem pool.

“I didn’t even know the U offered dial-up,” he said, as he used his laptop in Coffman Union. Lee said he probably wouldn’t have used the modem pool even if he had known about it.

“I have wireless on my laptop,” he said. “The U is pretty much wireless.”

First-year aerospace engineering student David Bursaw, who lives in a residence hall, said he also had no knowledge of the service.

“We have ResNet,” he said. “I wouldn’t need it.”

Martyr-Wagner, however, said that when it was most popular, many people used the modem pool.

“Lots of techie people have used dial-up because, early on, it was a really good way to access the University,” she said.

For John Geertz-Larson, an information technology professional for the University Libraries, the modem pool became obsolete long ago.

“I started using it around 1994,” he said, “but I probably haven’t used it more than twice in the past five years.”

Geertz-Larson said he’ll miss the modem pool in some situations.

“It would be nice to have it around for traveling,” he said, “but for most day-to-day things I want to use at home, the modem technology is just not fast enough.”

The old modem technology, Martyr-Wagner said, is another issue plaguing the pool. Modem pool equipment should be replaced every three to five years, and the University’s equipment is older than that.

“The cost to replace it is significant,” she said.

For those who still access the modem pool, the UMart Web site is selling subscriptions for Internet access from outside vendors.

Ron White, fiscal officer for the Office of Information and Technology, said he recommends that those interested in the new vendors look at UMart online and check out the plans that are offered.

Martyr-Wagner also said she recommended that current users of the modem pool look at the UMart options.

Some of the options online are cheaper per month than 110 hours online using the dial-up service, she said.

“Most technologies have a lifespan, and we simply can’t provide a good, stable service at the same costs,” she said. “One of these vendors can provide this service at a cost that is better for everyone.”

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