# Graphics downloads to us deprived dial-uppers



## Orrin (Mar 23, 2010)

Through no fault of our own this family is restricted to a dial-up Internet connection. Don't laugh, but with this particular machine I figure I'm walkin' in tall cotton if it connects at 14.4 kbps. We're at the very end of 96,000 feet of telephone cable (so the repairman tells me when I complain that the modem just connected at 6.9 kbps) and every corroded connection between here and there makes things pretty grim. 

This is a very graphics-intensive board. If someone leaves an interesting-sounding post I'll try reading it; but, if there are many photos posted, I'll get about the top 10-percent of each picture and then things "time out." No matter how I try to refresh, I never get to see the pictures. 

I doubt I'm the only member of this forum who has this problem. If I am, please disregard this post; but, if there are more besides me with this situation, do you suppose we could all work together so that we could make things better for everybody, not just the broadbanders? 

Here are some work-arounds:

1) I thought I'd try to set my preferences so that it would only show one post per page; however, if this software allows it, I've yet to find where I can make the adjustments. 

2) Is there a way that we could make more use of thumbnails? Thumbnails would allow the entire page to download quickly. If a particular picture catches anyone's fancy they can click on the thumbnail for that larger gorgeous view. Take this page, for instance:

http://www.smokstak.com/forum/showthread.php?t=71683

I think it would be in _everybody's__ interest to make use of thumbnails. The entire forum would get by with less bandwidth. The ISP would be happy. The viewers would be happy. So, why not?

3) If none of the above is possible, how about limiting the posts to fewer photos per post?

I think more use of thumbnails makes good sense. I don't want to step on a whole bunch of toes by saying this, but I don't know how else to do it. Many contributors will submit a large photo of nothing more than a piece of stock in a lathe chuck. We've all seen that sort of thing, before. I do not find it interesting and I doubt I am alone; therefore, if we had thumbnails we could easily see such-and-such is another stock-sticking-out-of-the-chuck-shot and we could ignore it. As it is, now, it is a big waste of a lot of peoples' time to wait for those mundane shots to download. 

As it is, now, from time-to-time I'll close up shop, pack up the laptop and head to town where I can log onto a broadband hotspot. For someone living quite some distance in the country, it wipes out a day. 

I'm only asking for a little consideration on behalf of all of us who are still on dial-up. If any of you have suggestions to improve the situation I'll gladly try them. 

Thank you. 

Orrin_


----------



## Cedge (Mar 23, 2010)

Bummer dude.... doncha just hate it when that happens? 

Steve


----------



## Troutsqueezer (Mar 23, 2010)

My phone line is like yours. Currently I am using Wildblue satellite to get around the problem. Its download speeds are not even close to advertised but still it's better than dial up, albeit not exactly cheap.

If this were not available to me I'd look into 3G. If that turned out to be impossible then it's a wait for Wi-Max which is scheduled for deployment in most major US cities by the end of 2010. If you are within about 35 miles of a major metropolitan network, it's in your near future.


----------



## Foozer (Mar 23, 2010)

Can feel your pain. Having nothing but dial-up access for years have seen the slower load times as pages become graphic happy. Looked at most alternative services but they all seem to have a usage cap of some sort that is easiely surpassed. Finally chose the all-you-can-eat Data-Pilot service (runs on T-Mobile service) which is 3G capable but as of yet is not in service in my part of the world. It does however normally run 4-5 times the speed of dial-up so at least reduces the pain somewhat.

Robert


----------



## ksouers (Mar 23, 2010)

Very good points there, Orrin.
Yes, being a little more dial-up friendly is better all around for the 'net and will help keep us in the good graces of our hosting service. As many know we have been running afoul with them lately.

The forum software will display a maximum size of 800x600. Posting a larger picture will not display larger, it just chews up more bandwidth and causes extra processing to size it down.

Some tips that will help:

1) Use a photo service such as Photobucket, Picasa or flickr. Two servers working in tandem is faster than just one and spreads out the load.

2) Crop the photo so the interesting part gets most of the picture. The pile of swarf next to your vise is not as interesting as the part that's in it.

3) While the forum can handle up to 800x600, 640x480 works quite well for most pictures and is a much smaller file.

4) Some editing software has a "JPEG Quality" setting. Setting this to about 85% saves a lot on the size of the file but is hardly noticeable in the picture at all.

5) Resize the picture before uploading to your photo service.

6) Be smart about the pictures you post. "One picture is worth a thousand words." Yes, it really is. Especially when your picture is showing something difficult to describe.

7) Your picture can also be posted as a link to your photo host.

There are lots of options for editing software. I have used Micro$oft's Picture Manager that comes with XP. Another is Easy Thumbs. Of course, for us Linux people there is Gimp. All of these work quite well and you don't have to spend thousands of dollars for Photo Shop.

For you dial-up guys: Some browsers have a setting to block/delay the download of photos. Consider using it. The photo can still be viewed via the link, but it then becomes your choice what you want to see.


----------



## doc1955 (Mar 23, 2010)

Just a tip when posting pictures you can turn down your resolution to 72 with out noticeable quality change but will greatly decrease file size.


----------



## Blogwitch (Mar 23, 2010)

I have been beating on about this for ages, but it runs off some peoples' backs as water does off a duck.

The web is getting more crowded every day, and an 'I'm alright Jack' attitude will start to slow everything down even further, and when it starts to affect those people who take no notice about things such as this, they will be the ones who will be screaming about it first, when they start to get slow downloads and unable to connect messages.

I have a very fast download speed, but some of the pics put up on here take even ages with mine, for someone with dial up, I suppose it could take over an hour for just one, and I have great pity for them, as most time it isn't a matter of cash to get a faster line, but where you live that forces you down that route.

I have shown this link before, and a few people have now started to use the program, you can usually tell, because they are now watermarking their piccies. 

It is FREE , so why not use it? Learn how easy it is to set up and convert hundreds of pics, or just one at a time in a matter of seconds. It does lots more as well, I use it to first correct colour casts, then reduce in size and quality, rename, and finally put my watermark in, as once set up, you have no need to play about every time, just a couple of clicks and everything gets done. The pics are upload ready, and real tiny in size.

http://www.faststone.org/FSResizerDetail.htm

So please, think of the unfortunates as well, not just yourself.


Bogs


----------



## kf2qd (Mar 23, 2010)

I don't know all your situation, but when we moved to South Texas, out on a rual road we didn't need a landline because we (my wife and I) had cell phones and I was able to get a wireless setup for what we were paying for a phone line and dialup service in Indiana. It runs at a 30K/sec download speed (yeah, I know...) which is about 6x dialup and I can use it with services such as Skype - as long as I stick to the conversation and don't try to surf at the same time... Don't know if anything like that is available in your area but it does make an affordable alternative if you don't really need the landline for anything else.

Pete


----------



## Cedge (Mar 23, 2010)

John
I have a problem with anyone complaining about bandwidth shortages and then flying streaming video on VOIP connections, such as Skype. There is no shortage of bandwidth these days, as it increases on a daily basis. The pipes are getting bigger and the available speeds are predicted to more than double in the near future

I first came on the net when it was still dial up at 2400 baud ( can you say "Prodigy"). Prior to that it was locally owned bulletin boards at 300 baud and strict real time allotments. I did web site development when band width was scarce and one could get publicly flogged for posting more than one small photo, so I'm very aware of download times and bandwidth husbandry. I crunch photo files to the point of distortion, even today. 

I've gotten the same complaint about my own steam related web site. 4.6 million visitors had no problems with it being photo heavy, but the dozen or so 14.4 dial up users who complained, all demanded my site be changed to meet their desires. 3 of them even complained to my ISP, trying to force the site to either be changed or taken down. 

 One can now subscribe to an "air card" service for mobile phones that will grant high speed access from the most remote locations, even while rolling along any highway or sitting in the deepest backwoods. I have sympathy for those on dial up, but I'm not going to base my posting habits on those, now long archaic, restrictions.

Steve


----------



## Blogwitch (Mar 23, 2010)

Steve,

Please don't dig at me because I use the web for what I want to do, that is getting very personal, and very close to the drawn line.

I am doing no more than what billions of other people are doing when using their mobiles for such things, and I will say now, I don't even own such a thing any more, it was consigned to the bin when the initial 20 squid I put on it ran out after more than six years. 

I am now considered one of the very special few who won't drop down dead unless one has a mobile phone glued, nailed or plugged into the side of ones head.

I can afford to buy any method of internet connection I want, but that does not mean I should use it unwisely, and penalise people who are not as fortunate as myself, in that they most probably can't afford to spend the money to get a better connection. As far as I am concerned, they have just as much right to see my pics as well as everyone else. If that means skinning my pics down to almost nothing, then so be it.

Also, I am not relating to websites such as yours, where your displayed pictures compared to a site such as this is only a drop in the ocean. But I do sympathise deeply with people who don't have the bandwidth with which to view yours, rather than treating them as sorts of social outcasts. Have and have not springs to mind, penalising the poor because they can't get up to your own standards.

Another thing, I am not trying to force anyone to do anything, maybe just gently nudging them towards being a little more considerate to other peoples needs. What is wrong with that?

I even gave a free and easy method to do it, and most probably it would make their own pictures even better.

If people want to go with their grossly overloaded web archives and most probably their own computers as well, then they are welcome to it. But in the long run, no matter what you say, things will start to slow down, no matter how big the pipes get, or will cost a lot more as more storage is brought on line, either on the web or sites like this, mainly because of all the unnecessary bulk in viewable files, and they will get larger and larger as megapixel sizes grow in cameras. 

There is only so much the naked eye can discern, so why is it all needed for posting small pictures on websites. One upmanship most probably, or even pi**ing contests. My limit is 2MP at times, 1MP mostly. Large MP is OK for pictures of loved ones that need to be blown up to 4ft x 3ft, or to fill the widescreen telly, but not the lowly 8"x6" we require on here.

I use a large amount of pictures to get information across, but by using the methods I do, I can almost guarantee that twenty of my pic files don't equal one of the heavyweight files that some other people use, and mine are perfectly good enough for website viewing, well at least I think so, because no-one has ever complained about not being able to see them (except when I lost a few). 
In the meagre 150MB of my free photobucket account, I reckon I should be able to fit approx 8 to 9,000 of my skinned down, but very useable pictures. My problem won't be the number of pictures I can store, but the bandwidth used by people opening my posts and viewing my pictures. That is the only reason I need to go for a paying account.

I am just one amongst the billions posting pictures onto the web, but I am under maybe the false hope about acorns and oak trees. A few are already doing it, now if those few can persuade a few more......... everyone will be able to see ALL of the pictures.

Also, if it was in my control, all websites would be limited to a max pic size in KB.

But because it isn't, we will all have to put up with obese sized pictures, except for an unfortunate certain few, who will never be able to view them at all.

John


----------



## Thingibob (Mar 23, 2010)

Orrin, 

I understand your pain, really I do. But I find thumbnails really annoying, so much so I rarely click them.

Personally this as most other sites don't have enough pictures, pictures really do help to convey the message of the poster and make for a more interesting read all-round.


----------



## Kermit (Mar 23, 2010)

I too, come from the dark slow days of early digital; having my very first commodore 64 at the tender age of 20. I understand what a slow connection is like. I also understand having something 99% of the rest of the world does not.

Expecting those 99% to change is ridiculous. 

Right now, I'm ahead of the curve. Windows 7 64 bit premium duo core etc etc etc. It means I can't view Youtube videos, or most any other video on the web because of 'lack of operating system support'/

Ahead of the curve or behind it, one cannot expect special provisions be made for such a small fraction of the population.  It's either in the works and will be released soon, or all support for it has been dropped. take your pick.

If you are not part of 'the pack', then you are in a tough place, when concerned with consumer support issues.


Sorry for those who can't see something,or whose computer refuses to accept a new sites html version. And better luck with your ISP!

I'm calling mine up right now and DEMAND that the world wide web be turned off until they all get some support for those of us using 64 bit browsers.

It's only fair? right?

 ;D


----------



## shred (Mar 23, 2010)

Back when modems were common, there were web-based browser proxy agents that would down-res pictures for dial-up surfers. Surely some of those services are still around? You'd get the pictures in blurry Monet-mode, but fast, and could click them if you wanted to wait and see the whole thing.


----------



## kcmillin (Mar 23, 2010)

This is less of a comment and more of an observation, but this debate seems to have similarities to the health care debate in the US. 

Some people do the right thing for the wrong reasons, and others to the wrong thing for the right reasons, but both are right in a way. Right?

My sympathy goes to those with slow net access, If this were a buisness I would try to expand my clientel to as many people as possible.

Reminds me of the "Americans with disabilties Act", specificly the handicap parking spots. The government forces buisnesses to have accomodations for the disabled, but wouldn't it be bad buisness practice not to?

My point is, there is only one thing that everybody should know, The "Golden Rule" treat others the way you want them to treat you. But nobody can tell you what that is. It should come natural.

kel


----------



## tmuir (Mar 23, 2010)

I like the photos, so much so if a thread doesn't catch my eye with an interesting photo I quite often don't even read it.
I would also agree thumbnails are a pain.
When you see it here it is most often because the photos have been uploaded to the forum gallery, which isn't perminant so if someone 6 months from now finds an interesting thread the photos may be all gone.

But on the other hand I agree there is no need for huge photos.
I take all my photos at 10 megapixels. I then crop them to get rid of the unimportant bit and then resize that to between 450 and 750 pixels wide as the picture requires.
I also tweak the jpeg quality slider in photos that don't need to be super sharp to lower the file size too.
Photos are the life and blood of forums like this and I think making them only thumbnails would be to the detriment to the forum, but it also doen't hurt us all to put a couple of extra seconds in to crop photos down in size before posting.


----------



## rake60 (Mar 23, 2010)

My first internet connection involved a modem with two foam cups to fit 
a telephone hand set into. There were no pictures in those days and the
lines of text would stream in one line at a time. 

There are some options available under the "Profile Settings"
Click on the "Profile" button and then select "Look and Layout Preferences"
In that window check the boxes.
"Don't show users' avatars."
and
"Don't show users' signatures."
Then click the "Change Profile" button.

You will no longer see avatars or signatures, but it will speed up your
viewing of the site.

Rick


----------



## Cedge (Mar 23, 2010)

Oh dear.....Another drawn line?....(innocent grin). Mine was simply a nod to an obvious irony. 

As for file crunching, I long ago learned to get quality images in the KB range, even when using animations. Cropping, reduction and some refocusing tricks are just part of SOP here...as it should be for anyone posting photos. If my 700 x 512 pixel images won't download, then it might be a caching problem in the browser being used. I.E. has a longstanding history of dragging to a halt when the cache gets full.

I'm among those who very seldom click on the thumbnails. The full sized photos in a post are often what make me stop and read the whole thread. Tony has a definite point about the time limits on attached thumbnails. Nothing is more annoying than a thread where they have gone off into the ether, leaving one trying to imaging what was once shown.

Sorry if it offends... but that is just how it is.

Steve


----------



## Orrin (Mar 23, 2010)

> If this were not available to me I'd look into 3G.



As I understand it, 3G is line of sight. Is that correct? Every heard of Hells Canyon, the deepest gorge in North America. Well, we're downstream from there but where we're at it is still a quarter of a mile deep. We lose cell phone service when we turn the corner and head down the canyon. 

I'm not quite sure I understand the percentages, but what with all the recent news about the FCC's push for expanding broadband service there has been mention of the considerable fraction of the population still on dial-up. 

Orrin


----------



## Orrin (Mar 24, 2010)

> I understand what a slow connection is like. I also understand having something 99% of the rest of the world does not.
> 
> Expecting those 99% to change is ridiculous.



Kermit, I hope you did not imply that I am expecting those 99% to change. If you were, go back and read my original post. I said that if I were the only one in my type of situation, ignore my post. 

Orrin


----------



## bearcar1 (Mar 24, 2010)

Oh what a paradigm world we live in. There is, only so much bandwidth available to the world. With more and more individuals and groups of same all attempting to capture an ever larger portion of that finite amount, it becomes a never ending battle of faster throughput rates. It will, in the near future become a matter of how that information is processed and transmitted that will be the key, and the speed will become secondary. Today, I agree with only using the bare bones minimum of bandwidth as needed to post up information, be it photos or text. By that I mean, I do not find it necessary to post mega-sized photos in their highest definition when a much, much smaller photo that contains well focused and cropped images will suffice. Now in order to do that, one needs to keep in mind the fact that even though "this will be a great shot showing my work" etc., there is no real need for having that stray coffee mug that has been innocently captured in pixels for all of eternity to be included and shared with the rest of the world along with your latest endeavor. Close ups should include details and should occupy the majority of said shot either by carefully aiming the shot or by cropping the shot afterwards or both. Then, reducing the pixel size can also reduce the demands on the bandwidth available, there is no need to use the huge 800x1200 formats for most everyday usage, save those images for when you need to make billboard size enlargements, not when you want to display that newest valve linkage you just labored 12hrs over. Now I'm not saying we should all change in order to please a handful of users that do not have the higher speed connections available to them but to use common sense and just a bit of restraint to ease the burdens that are being placed upon the internet and websites by not doing so. As the compression/decompression technologies become more advanced, perhaps we will not have to struggle as much for a bigger piece of the networking pie and will finally be free of such bottlenecks but until that day arrives, I think that we should be just a bit more aware of what we all can be doing to not clog up what little space is available. It will be better for everyone, including the users that still use dial-up services.

BC1
Jim


----------



## Blogwitch (Mar 24, 2010)

This is what I was trying to explain in my previous post. I found some pics on my off computer storage archive, and selected one that sort of sums up the types of pictures we use on here.

This first one is a heavyweight at 1.5MB, taken on a max of 2 megapixels and it took up over 10 times the normal storage I would generally allow in my photobucket account, and hence a few of you will notice that it does take a fair time to load into this post.







This is after being put straight thru the resizer, and was ready to use about one second after I pressed the convert button, and was skinned down to a modest 150KB, still a little large for my liking, but it does show that there is very little difference in the two except for the obvious size one. Which could easily be remedied by tweaking a couple of figures in the program, which I won't do, as this is the standard display size I use for all my pics now.






This is the way I feel I should be going to help the unfortunates with slow speeds, and also maybe prevent nasty things happening on the web in the future.

From taking 50 shots in the shop (three without and two with flash for each shot), sorting thru them to get the ones I want (I very rarely crop, I tend to do that when taking the pic), to using 10 in an article I am writing, maybe 15 minutes or less of my time. A small price to pay in my mind.

Bogs


----------



## bearcar1 (Mar 24, 2010)

Thank you Bogs for incorporating those photos into this discussion as it is exactly the point I was referring to in my previous post. We all really should make a concerted effort to do these simple, often overlooked and usually taken for granted functions. Doing so will ensure that not only this web site, which we all hold in high regard, as well as the rest of the civilized (?) cyberworld, will remain available to us without undo restriction.(keep in mind the recent 'overusage' events that occurred resulting in this website being taken off line for a period of time) As a fellow member I am asking nicely that we all discipline ourselves towards practicing smart bandwidth usage, it WILL pay off big dividends in the future. Well focused/cropped and visually centered images that have been reduced down to manageable pixel sizes is all that is required. Also spreading the word to others that may not be aware of the bandwidth limitations will slowly initiate a change in the way the public uses this technology. 

BC1
Jim


----------



## itowbig (Mar 24, 2010)

i really dont mind small pics as long as i can make them bigger (failing eyes) and i for one really never thought about those with dial up. so to me it would be more considerate to just put in smaller pics and thumb nails are not that bad as long as i can clik them to make them bigger. i just dont know how to make those yet. 
so i really dont see why we all cant just make this site more enjoyable for all. after all is this just want its about enjoyment. this is my 2 pennys  and thats my story and im sticken to it.


----------



## cobra428 (Mar 24, 2010)

I'm with Sid,
How do you make small pics and have them enlarge when you click? I noticed there seems to be two kinds...ones that just get big and ones that go to a temp download to open.

Tony


----------



## Troutsqueezer (Mar 24, 2010)

As for Internet bandwidth, I believe photographic images don't even show up on the radar when the trend now is to download HD movies, television shows, anything thru Youtube, Hulu, Netflix, DirectTV On Demand, etc. Now there's some bandwidth. 

-T


----------



## bearcar1 (Mar 24, 2010)

Perhaps there is a bit of a misunderstanding regarding the usage of the terms that have been employed in this thread referencing photo 'size' (yes it DOES matter but not here ;D) The physical 'size' of an image does not have to change, that can remain the same. Just for conversation lets us explore Bogs' examples. The first of that series is a high resolution (number of total pixels) photo. Now, say this photo were 1200x800 format and was being uploaded (sent) or downloaded (being viewed), the network connection (internet) would have to transmit that HUGE amount of data in order to for an end user to visually see it. Now for some of the high speed DSL linked connection users this would not seem to present too much of a problem. BUT.... for the dial-up users out there and you all know who you are ;D this can be quite time consuming and can lead to transmission time outs due to the speed at which this huge amount of data is being handled. Sure, the photo clearly shows the bits of swarf on the carriage stop but is that truly required or necessary? Not really. Now, also included in that same photo is quite a bit of the surrounding machine (very nice nice machine BTW). This portion of the photo is really incidental but the fact remains that all of those pixels that make up that area of the photo has to be sent along as well. Wasted bandwidth as it were. Now then, the second photo, although it is displayed as a physically smaller image has also been reduced in the number of pixels used down to a much leaner image of say 600x200 pixels. Notice now that the image quality has not degraded THAT noticeably and the small swarf bits exist but not quite as sharp detail as in the first example. So what, we all know what swarf looks like right? :big: But the time required to transmit or receive this second 'downsized' image is cut by probably at least 60% due to the fact that there is not nearly as much data making up the image size. If the photo were to be cropped of the areas surrounding the carriage stop the transfer or throughput speeds would be increased as well, again because there is not as much data that has to be handled. The PHYSICAL picture size can remain the same just the amount of electronic information that is being handled (bandwidth) is much less. Its the reduction of the information needed to represent the image that is key to the bandwidth issues and not so much the speed of the connection although they are related to one another. Less is more as it were, less data required for a clear image equals faster transferal speeds and less mass storage archival space needed (hard drive space). If everyone were to use the ever increasing megapixel formats all of the time, the extra and mostly not needed information will lead to a slowdown of transmission speeds across the entire network at the basic levels. As has been stated previously, define your focal points (get as much of the pertinent subject matter (ei: the carriage stop) in your view finder and cut down the pixel size format, unless of course that you are planning on making life-sized posters for a living. The low-res (less pixels) formats begin to loose their clarity quickly when being enlarged so it is a happy medium. We just have to be aware of the impact that something as simple as taking a picture has become as technology in data transfer and storage struggle to stay ahead of the demands.

BC1
Jim


----------



## Troutsqueezer (Mar 24, 2010)

I should mention that for a good number of photographs, it's the stuff in the background that interests me most. I have made changes in my shop based on what I see in the background of some pics posted here. :hDe:


----------



## cobra428 (Mar 24, 2010)

BC1
I realize that the size of the pic 150GB or 1KB. I just figured while we where on the subject of pics.

Tony


----------



## Orrin (Mar 24, 2010)

Jim (BC1) and Bog, thank you for your level-headed and intelligent posts. Both of you are to be commended. 

Most people do not realize that the information superhighway can get overcrowded. Overloading it is just like rush hour traffic on a ten-lane highway that barely moves at a crawl. 

People who have satellite Internet connections understand this. During peak hours their service moves at a crawl. Many say that is is no better than dial-up. Only just so much data can be squeezed through that little pipe. 

Every Internet user should understand their obligation to eliminate transmitting unnecessary data. Unfortunately, Micro$oft users are led to believe that their 10 Megapixel picture only barely fills the screen. That is because Micro$oft's slide show and viewing programs automatically resize those monsters down to fit the monitor. 

Many people send those ten meg pictures. When they arrive at the destination they must be resized to 100 kilobytes in order to see the darned thing. It's stupid! Why send ten megs when 100 k will do?

It is things like this that cause satellite service to move at a crawl. It is things like this that cause Web sites to exceed their ISP's bandwidth allowance. 

When I made the OP, I had not idea how many users of this site were on dial-up. I figured the intelligent thing to do was to bring up the topic for discussion. I did not expect the 99% to change their ways to suit my whims. For all any of us know, perhaps the ratio of dial-uppers to DSL-ers is more like 75/25. Who knows unless someone raises the issue and intelligent discourse reveals the answer?

Please keep in mind that the first thing I attempted to do was set my preferences to display fewer posts per page. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be an option with this forum's software. I hoped that I had overlooked something and that by mentioning it someone would point the way to setting that preference. 

I had no idea that folks disliked thumbnails. To me, they're the smart way to go and I like them. Alright, I admit I was wrong. Forget thumbnails. 

There is one thing that posters could do to accommodate bandwidth-challenged members of this forum. It would only take two key strokes, Ctrl-C and Ctrl-V. 

It's this way. When posting pictures one needs to provide the URL of image source. When they do that all they'd have to do is copy it (Ctrl-C), then paste it into the text they include with the picture. (Ctrl-V) That way, the deprived can obtain each picture from the source. 

Posters could do this act of kindness as a favor. It would get them their gold star for the day. 

I am very grateful to those of you who made thoughtful and calm replies to this topic. 

Best regards, 

Orrin


----------



## ksouers (Mar 24, 2010)

Troutsqueezer  said:
			
		

> As for Internet bandwidth, I believe photographic images don't even show up on the radar when the trend now is to download HD movies, television shows, anything thru Youtube, Hulu, Netflix, DirectTV On Demand, etc. Now there's some bandwidth.
> 
> -T



Data is data. It all counts. Doesn't matter if it's a picture or a Word document or the latest Bruce Willis movie. The networks don't know the difference. It all counts because only one packet of data can reside on a line at any fraction of an instant in time. The next packet can't move till the first packet is cleared. It doesn't matter if it's DSL or dial-up. 

The problem is infrastructure, we are using 40 year old technology to move data. The US is behind many other countries in regards to infrastructure. Our high end DSL runs about 6 meg with an average of about 2 meg, the average in South Korea is 9 meg. How did that happen?



			
				Orrin  said:
			
		

> That is because Micro$oft's slide show and viewing programs automatically resize those monsters down to fit the monitor.



Excellent point. Many browsers will also do the same. The point is that MORE information is being sent than is necessary or than will be used. It ends up being a waste of resources needlessly being transmitted. Do you Tivo television? I do. An hour program is really only 40 minutes. 20 minutes of air time, and disk space, is wasted to commercials. I just zip right through them. Sending too much data in the form of an oversized picture is the same thing.

With careful cropping the actual subject of the picture can be shown larger and in more detail than originally thought, yet still be contained in a much smaller file simply by getting rid of the unnecessary information.

Color depth is another area that can reduce file size. Personally, I have a bit of difficulty telling the difference between 24 bit and 32 bit color depth, but my network can simply because of the difference in the file sizes.


----------



## Cedge (Mar 24, 2010)

Orrin
Your simple solution is both elegant and effective. By adding the URL for the photos, you'd still have linked access even if the page timed out before the images loaded. 

I haven't forgotten the days when one had to code web sites to meet the requirements of as many as 8 different browsers. To say it was challenging would be an understatement of the highest order. While I never want to go back to those days, I'll have to admit your solution is worthy of being widely accepted. I'll concede the point and will try to remember to add them when I begin my next build log. 

Been a LONG time since I've encountered the BW police......I would have thought they would have evolved their arguments a little more, over time. Still much the same stuff as it was back in the early 90's.

Steve


----------



## Blogwitch (Mar 24, 2010)

Kevin,

I am on an ADSL2 line, which in theory can give 24 meg download speed, but that very rarely happens. It all depends on how far you are away from the telephone exchange. If you are say within 1/2 mile, you would get somewhere around 20megs, or like myself, who is on the outer limits of about 3 miles, I get between 5 and 7 megs download and a permanent 1 meg upload speed. When you first go online, they send the full speed to you, and measure how many dropped packages you get. Over the course of the first month, they gradually reduce the speed until you get no further dropped packets. It then remains around that speed all the time then, and even though I am on a high contention rate of about 30, it never falls below the lower figure of 5 megs.

But as I have said, even though big pictures don't affect me at all, I still try to get them as small as possible.

Bogs


----------



## shred (Mar 24, 2010)

FWIW, since I sometimes research this kind of stuff for a living:

The internet 'backbones' are nowhere near capacity. There's 'dark fiber' all over the place unused. The limits are on the "last mile" to the user and occasionally across oceans or to individual ISPs.

In March 2009, 7% of US internet connections were via some sort of dial-up. That number went below 10% in early 2008 and is on a fairly slow, steady ramp down, but has slowed considerably in recent years (US Broadband only passed up dial-up as the #1 connection in late 2004)

China has the most broadband connections. Japan, Korea and France by far out-pace everybody else's broadband as far as average connection speed. Wireless bandwidth is going through the roof, but will start out limited to metro and high-population areas.

---

As all my pictures are hosted on my own server, sitting at the end of a noisy DSL, I try to keep my images a reasonable size. It hides the scratches too 

As I mentioned earlier, there are also proxy servers out there that will auto-shrink images before shuttling them down a phone line to you if you're bandwidth-limited.


----------



## Cedge (Mar 24, 2010)

Shred
My ISP tracking system also indicates the dial up connections are between 6 and 7% of the total. agree with the surplus you've noted. The choke points do tend to be much closer to the end user than the backbone. 

I'm in the process of planning a revamp of my steam site. It was designed when the dominant screen size was 800 x600. With the much higher resolutions in use today, the site now looks tiny on screen and the 500 pixel photos are harder to see. I'm looking to add links to larger format images in the 800x 600, 1024 x 768 and 1280 x 1024 ranges. I'm alos looking at adding (gasp) videos of the engines running. Yup.... I'm going to increase my BW usage and pray the web doesn't come to a crashing halt in the process. 

Steve


----------



## bearcar1 (Mar 25, 2010)

Until the technology for fiber to the NID at the entrance to the structure (your home) becomes affordable the bottlenecks that are being encountered will continue to be an ever increasing problem. When the day finally arrives that we are able to affordably obtain that luxury, the end users will continue to stumble along at a snails pace, keeping the web's potential at a low percentage rate. Now, if the end users were to have such resources available to them, then the web would become more and more congested at the higher gateway levels due to the increase in bandwidth demand but then the throughput speeds should increase dramatically and the ISPs should be able to handle the higher transfer rates easier as the routers and such would not have to deal with as much compression/decompression at the source and destination addresses. I have been in subdivisions where there is a glass backbone already in place to the structure but it is not lit up because no company wishes to pay for the equipment to be installed at both ends of the glass so end users wind up using copper to the routers and that also keeps the transferal rates much slower. 

BC1
Jim


----------



## cobra428 (Mar 25, 2010)

Jim,
What are you talking about fiber to the door? I have it. My town was the second beta site after Kaleen TX to get it from Verizon 5 years ago. Affordable $35 a month. All the phone you want $35 a month. TV basic $35 a month. If you go full bore $180 a month will do phone, int, and all the HD TV and other then you could imagine.

I'll never go to cable or sat again!

Tony


----------



## bearcar1 (Mar 25, 2010)

Man you must live in the 'high rent district', Tony. ;D Most locales do not have that, at least not here in the Chicagoland area. The latest and greatest here is AT&T's U-verse packages but that again is copper coaxial cable and quite pricey to boot. Fiber to the serving pedestals is spotty in some areas around here but glass to the door, I've not heard of it here. Always talk, but never any follow through. 

BC1
Jim


----------



## cobra428 (Mar 25, 2010)

Jim,
I don't know about the high rent district but Kaleen TX had it for a year before us. Verizon waited a year after me to start spreading it around the rest of Long Island, then into the city.

I'm known as the pioneer by the techs. I was one of the first to get it. I called every day to find out when my CO will get it!

Cable and sat have been soiling their undies since. 10 cable commercials on TV to 1 FIOS.

This is FIOS this is Big!  When you start to hear that it's coming. I'm really surprised that Chi town doesn't have it yet. Is Verizon around by you?

Tony


----------



## doc1955 (Mar 25, 2010)

Cedge  said:
			
		

> Orrin
> Your simple solution is both elegant and effective. By adding the URL for the photos, you'd still have linked access even if the page timed out before the images loaded.
> 
> 
> Steve



Just a note when a photo time out and doesn't load just right click click copy location and open a new window past the copied location and you will be taken to the photo. Just because the url isn't listed it is there.
But I do agree photos should be down sized 72 resolution is all the higher you should go not 200 or even 300.
Another good optimizer is web-graphics optimizer but it isn't free that is the program I use and it works good.


----------



## bearcar1 (Mar 25, 2010)

Tony, Naperville is I believe the fourth or fifth largest city in the state of Illinois, pop. 115+K. Ameritech (what was once Illinois Bell, anyone still remember The Bell System?) went through this area and placed a fiber backbone for cable TV service but it was/is only to the local serving area X-box and not to the neighborhood pedestals, nothing is to the back of the structures. In my instance as well as other areas of the country, I believe that the infrastructure does not exist to that level even and if it does, like our metro area, there isn't enough support equipment installed in the wire center (CO) to support ISP service. No one wants to spend the $$$$$$, they just want to rape the communities for cable TV and phone services.

BC1
Jim


----------



## shred (Mar 25, 2010)

DOCSIS 3.0 will get to most of our houses long before fiber-- they're saying 100 million homes in the US by late 2012. 50Mbit/s down, 10Mbit/s up isn't FIOS but pretty nice even so. In fact many cablecos have already rolled out the 3.0 head end equipment, but haven't flipped it on yet.

LTE and 4GPP are poised to do roughly the same thing in the wireless space, but it'll be 2013-2014 before I think we'll see that in mass adoption.


----------

