Well, the word "unlimited" is not enough. There are 2 basic phrases that get bandied about in the ISP industry, as it pertains to a dial-up connection.
1) "Unlimited Access": This phrase is wrought with all types of assumptions and can take on different meanings, depending on the perspective of the person reading it. a) It means I have no restrictions on how long or how much I use the Internet. b) You can dial-up any time you like, as often as you like.
Both assumptions are covered by that phrase, thanks to our English language. Neither is wrong, but the interpretation can be very different from both the client and ISP perspective. It's always good to get what the ISP means by that phrase, as it really is a marketing hype phrase.
2) "Unlimited Dial-Up Access": This is the phrase AppLink uses, and many other ISP's for describing the ability to dial up andtime you like, as often as you like. It allows the ISP to place other restrictions, not associated with dial-up perse, such as inactivity timeouts, or session timeouts on the account. Again, some clients will not like that particular perspective, but that is just a matter of perspective.
Now, there are 2 things you sign up to when you activate an account with an ISP.
1) TOS: "Terms of Service"; This is the document that will describe, in detail, how all account types work and any restrictions to said accounts. It covers how the ISP would like you to use your connection, without regard to any data on the connection. It also covers any potential liability isses.
2) AUP: "Acceptable Use Policy"; This describes what the ISP will and will not allow after you have established you connection. The AUP can cover some items about the connection in regards to how much time a connection is used, but that is usually in the TOS.
At AppLink, we do have a 30 minute inactivity timer and we do have a 6 hour session timeout, which drops the connection regardless of what is happening.
Some people hate it and move on. Any ISP not having controls in place, such as the above, allows thier modem pools to be potentially dominated by a small group of clients.
This is bad. ISP's depend on user to modem ratios in thier pricing and if they cannot run thier business with those ratios, they will be out of business or forced to raoise thier price and reduce the user to modem ratio.
Typically, an ISP charing $19.95/month U.S. is running a user to modem ratio of 8:1. It can be higher depending on the number of modem ports they have. You usually cannot reach 8:1 until you have between 65 and 75 modem ports, which translates to about 560 clients. Busy signals are virtually non-existant in this scenario.
When you reach about 100 ports, you can raise the user to modem ratio to about 8.5:1, without any busies and so on. Support is usually good.
ISP's charging $9.95/month U.S. usually run thier pools at 12:1. These ISP's depend on having about 300-400 modem ports to minimize busy signals and live on very thin margins. Support is usually pretty scanty as well.
Personally, I like clients that play games online. They use far less bandwidth than most any other client and that is where the ISP pays the most (right after support). I would rather extend a modem pool to meet online player demands than replace that player with a bandwidth hog, because it is cheaper to do so.
Although, I do know most ISP's hate gamers, because gamers do want to be online for longer than the average person.
Glad it worked out for you.
