ISP Providers

[Guest]

I know this has been discussed before but can anyone advise on an good ISP when one is cruising. The main problem with all the free email adresses, is that you can't save them to disc and read them at your leisure back at the boat. What I really want is something that gives me access to Outlook Express or something similar for a reasonable price. Can anyone help?

 

[rogerm]

Norma
I haven't seen the 'befores', all I can say is that my daughter has been cruising round the Med for the last year. She uses 'yahoo.co.uk' for her email. I send her email, scans, pictures etc every few days. She accesses her email using Cybercafes or private email addresses (as available) and downloads it all onto floppy which she then takes back to their boat and reads at leasure using their laptop. I am fairly certain she is using Outlook express or MS Outlook to read her email.
So as far as I can see the answer to your question is to use an email address than can be accessed from the web rather than directly. If you use UK Tiscali you can access your email directly OR via the web, as you please. Or use yahoo or hotmail for a web only access, then the actual ISP doesn't matter.
Roger

 

[andy_wilson]

http://www.dial.pipex.com

Pipex have an international service giving local dial up access in many countries.

Costs though.

Many UK ISP's now use caller ID to prevent calls from overseas accessing servers as a security feature.

 

[claymore]

Yes
I agree with this - my daughter has been in Equador and Colombia for the past 12 months and uses hotmail. If however you want a wider internet useage than email and need an ISP you'd be best advised to post this on the motorboaty forum as they are all webheads over there and will be able to tell you exactly what you need to do and with whom
regards
John

 

[Guest]

I use AOL in UK waters although they do have international access numbers. I can dial in from a mobile on the boat using an IR link to my laptop. AOL do not charge extra for access from a mobile so you pay for the call at standard local mobile rates - probably cheaper than a cyber cafe for email sending / receiving and certainly more convenient.

 

[Guest]

Do you have a fast phone? Can you save your emails to disk or CD. There are loads of free emails about but all are web based and you can't save.

 

[Guest]

It used to be the case that you had to use web based e mail like hotmail or yahoo, but nowadays you can access e mail accounts with the non web based ones (such as freeserve or virgin) using any isp. In other ways these are better - you rarely get rubbish and unwanted pornography on virgin or freeserve, whilst in my experience it is a plague on hotmail.

If you do chose hotmail, then do not use your name as the address but make up something wacky - that minimises the porno problem.

Until now, i have used uk isp but recently virgin have insisted on an 0870 number from abroad which ran up a bill of £5 from spain (on a spanish mobile) within a minute. Most people install a foreign sim card in their mobile when cruising abroad, but the problem is that many foreign pay as you go contracts do not allow access to local data numbers. So you may well have a local phone number for aol (say) but you cant get it on a mobile unless you have a monthly mobile contract. The alternative of using a uk sim again makes the call an expensive one

It looks to me as if the best solution now is to take out a local e mail address with the company where you buy your mobile sim. You can set up mail forwarding from your UK e mail address and this should ensure that you are effectivrely a local in cost terms.

One final tip. Give your mobile number to those near and dear who might have urgent messages - they can then send you a text message if there is an urgent e mail. Saves having to check up quite so frequently.

 

[Guest]

I have a Nokia 8210 which has a standard 9600 data modem (not WAP). Copy the text of emails from Hotmail / Yahoo and paste into wordpad / Notepad or right click on images and attachments and save to disk. Reverse this for sending to save online time. Any Phone with an IR port will connect to the internet

 

[Guest]

I\'ve found it

I have been desperately seeking an email provider that I can access from anywhere, which would give me an Outlook type service and at last I've found it. You can access it through your Iridium phone, using Iridium as your data gateway and then connect to the net and this extremely fast site and download all your emails from up to 10 other addresses and all for $20 a year, they even screen out large attatchments.

 

[ArthurWood]

If you have access to any ISP you can access virtually any e-mail account using www.mail2web.com