ST
Of course the concept of 100 free hours was just that - 100 free hours via freephone number. Back in the days before Freeserve came along, one had to pay the phone call charges AND the charges to AOL/Compuserve, and it was only at dial-up speed, something like (if you're lucky) 28kbps. You were considered top dog if you had a modem that could connect at the then breakneck speeds of 56kbps.
I didn't think the 100 hours free was even via a freephone number, just you could use AOL / Compuserve for 100 hours without paying the monthly fee to them. The actual dialup number was via a local PoP (pop point of presence) which was in the same area code as your house and therefore it just cost a local call.
I remember first getting CompuServe in late 1995, the basic monthly fee (can't remember if it was £5 or £10 per month) only gave a limited number of hours e.g. 10 hours connection and you still had to to pay the phone call charges plus an extra charge to Compuserve for going over the 10 hours (not sure of the exact number). Although we had a 28.8 kbit/s modem, our local PoP in Preston or Liverpool only supported 9 kbit/s at first so the speed was limited to that. We could connect to a Manchester site which I thinks supported 14.4kbit per second but that wasn't a local call for us.
As you say when Freeserve came about and also BT offered packages with free evening and weekend calls then it made things much easier and cheaper.
I also remember an ISP called X-Stream in the late 90s which gave free access via an 0800 number on weekends until midday (I think) but you had to install their dialer software which placed a banner across the top of your screen showing adverts. Because of the amount of users it would also be quite slow to use and take many attempts to connect without just getting the engaged tone.
Ste
Founding member
Of course the concept of 100 free hours was just that - 100 free hours via freephone number. Back in the days before Freeserve came along, one had to pay the phone call charges AND the charges to AOL/Compuserve, and it was only at dial-up speed, something like (if you're lucky) 28kbps. You were considered top dog if you had a modem that could connect at the then breakneck speeds of 56kbps.
I didn't think the 100 hours free was even via a freephone number, just you could use AOL / Compuserve for 100 hours without paying the monthly fee to them. The actual dialup number was via a local PoP (pop point of presence) which was in the same area code as your house and therefore it just cost a local call.
I remember first getting CompuServe in late 1995, the basic monthly fee (can't remember if it was £5 or £10 per month) only gave a limited number of hours e.g. 10 hours connection and you still had to to pay the phone call charges plus an extra charge to Compuserve for going over the 10 hours (not sure of the exact number). Although we had a 28.8 kbit/s modem, our local PoP in Preston or Liverpool only supported 9 kbit/s at first so the speed was limited to that. We could connect to a Manchester site which I thinks supported 14.4kbit per second but that wasn't a local call for us.
As you say when Freeserve came about and also BT offered packages with free evening and weekend calls then it made things much easier and cheaper.
I also remember an ISP called X-Stream in the late 90s which gave free access via an 0800 number on weekends until midday (I think) but you had to install their dialer software which placed a banner across the top of your screen showing adverts. Because of the amount of users it would also be quite slow to use and take many attempts to connect without just getting the engaged tone.