Reader Todd emailed me the following:
For users on dial-up, there is help getting the mega downloads such as Open office or a Linux OS. Even at a full 56k a few hundred MB can take days. It can be faster and more convienient to request the download from On-disk.com
They will download, burn and ship. For customers in the US most orders arrive within 4 business days.
The website describes the service this way:
On-Disk.com is a Download & Burn Service
This makes it possible to obtain downloads that otherwise may be difficult; such as large downloads over dial-up, or when needing to install software on another computer, or to have necessary security updates on hand before installing/reinstalling an operating system.
I haven’t tried it (I have no need for it), but if you are still on dial-up and don’t have someone who can do this for you, it may be useful.
Check it out at http://on-disk.com/
There are other groups out there talking about On-disk.com here
http://community.compuserve.com/n/pfx/forum.aspx?nav=messages&tsn=1&tid=136257&webtag=ws-vintagecomp
Hope that helps.
Thanks Todd. The comments on that other forum are positive. I never thought of using it for some older software. One example was an older version of IE that Microsoft doesn’t support. And the price seems very reasonable.
Well this article kind of nails it on the head http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5750968/
While there is a majority of people with access to broad band, There are still just under half of all internet users on narrow band.
If you can get OpenOffice in 4 days on a CD or DVD… Or tie up your family phone line for that long… Well you get the idea.
Plus Karlie is great at answering questions email her at on-disk @ on-disk.com (scrunch together)