SLIPSTREAM WEB ACCELERATION COMPARISON

The DialBroadbandComparison User's Report:
SLIPSTREAM WEB ACCELERATION COMPARISON

This is one user's comparision of images that were downloaded when accessing webpages at the People website using the Nethere dial-up ISP with SLIPSTREAM web acceleration. This discussion and its fair use of the images are only for educational consumer comparison purposes by this user who is not employed by any ISP using this technology and has no interest in the Slipstream technology except as a mere user. Many dial-up ISPs provide Slipstream acceleration throughout North America. Slipstream acceleration, which requires the user to install slipstream proxy software on the user's PC, is suppose to "speed up" the accessing of webpages via dial-up internet by 3-to-5 times the normal speed. One very general simplistic way to explain how web acceleration works is that the "acceleration" would compress webpages when transmitting them from the website to the user's PC. The smaller in file size, particularly for graphics and pictures, then the "less" data to transmit and the "faster" in perceived speed. There is more to this acceleration process, but this is one simplistic way of describing web acceleration. The trick is in maintaining the image quality of how the webpage looks. Slipstream has several acceleration settings: (1) "Maximum" acceleration (image quality reduced significantly); (2) "Extremely High" acceleration (image quality reduced slightly); (3) "Very High" acceleration (image quality is considered "good"); (4) "High" acceleration (image quality is considered "very good"); (5) "Medium" acceleration (image quality is considered "excellent"); and (6) "Minimum" acceleration (original image quality). The Slipstream software, which has to be installed on the user's PC, has a default setting of "Very High" acceleration which should result in "good" image quality. For the Slipstream comparison shown on this webpage, we are using this default setting of "Very High" acceleration with "good" image quality. It should also be noted that after you install the slipstream software on your PC, you can turn it off if there are times when you don't want any web acceleration.

CLICK HERE FOR A RELATED "DIAL BROADBAND" ACCELERATION COMPARISON WITH DISCUSSION WHICH INCLUDES COMMENTS AND INFORMATION ABOUT HOW THE DISPLAY RESOLUTION SETTINGS ON A PC MAY AFFECT HOW YOU SEE ACCELERATED WEBPAGES

IF YOU ARE LOOKING AT THIS WEBPAGE WHILE USING AN ISP THAT HAS WEB ACCELERATION TURNED ON, THEN YOU MAY NOT PROPERLY SEE THE DIFFERENCE WHEN LOOKING AT THE PICTURES AND GRAPHICS ON THIS WEBPAGE.

INSTEAD, CLICK HERE TO GET A ZIP FILE WITH THE PICTURES FOR YOU TO COMPARE WHILE VIEWING ON YOUR PC.

Images with SLIPSTREAM (acceleration)	Images without SLIPSTREAM (no acceleration)
tcruise75-slipstream.jpeg	tcruise75-original.jpg
llohan150-slipstream.jpeg	llohan150-original.jpg
tomcruise75-slipstream.jpeg	tomcruise75-original.jpg
llohan-slipstream.jpeg	llohan-original.jpg
people_logo-slipstream.gif	people_logo-original.gif

NOTE THAT WITH THE PEOPLE LOGO, the SLIPSTREAM version of the logo tried to transform the original .GIF file into a more compressed .GIF file but was unsuccessful because the original .GIF file which is 3651 bytes in size got changed into a noticably worse looking .GIF file that is 21771 bytes larger in size. At least in this instance, Slipstream seems to have a problem with this .GIF file where the image quality is noticably worse and the file size is much larger which could make the webpage slower to download via a 56k dial-up internet connection.

BASIC DISPLAY RESOLUTION
SUGGESTIONS FOR WHEN YOU
ARE USING SLIPSTREAM
WEB ACCELERATION

(ALSO FOR IF YOU ARE
USING ANY OTHER DIAL-UP
WEB ACCELERATOR)

Set your Display Resolution at 1024x768

Don't use 800x600 or any other smaller resolution

If you set your display resolution at 800x600 (or smaller at 640x480), then you may most likely see any perceptibly noticable effects caused by the dial-up web acceleration process in pictures or graphics in webpages

Any compression in pictures or graphics due to the dial-up web acceleration would be LESS NOTICABLE or NOT NOTICABLE at the 1024x768 resolution

Most new PCs have 17-inch, 19-inch, or larger monitors and are already typically set at the 1024x768 as a default in windows

If you have an older PC or an older monitor, you may have your display resolution at 800x600 or smaller as a default and you may want to change your Display Property settings (CLICK HERE for directions on how to change your display resolution in Windows XP)

If you have to scroll horizontally in a maximized full-screen Internet Explorer browser when viewing many web pages, then you probably have your display resolution set at 800x600

If you have an older 15-inch, 14-inch, or smaller monitor, then you may want to upgrade to a larger monitor to more comfortably view windows and the internet in the 1024x768 resolution

OTHER INFORMATION
ABOUT DIAL-UP WEB
ACCELERATION

A dial-up web accelerator performs the acceleration by trying to further compress the file size of the files that make up a webpage including the pictures and graphics on the webpage as well as the HTML page itself

Expect original (unaccelerated) pictures and graphics on webpages to be web-quality pictures and not print quality: Pictures and graphics on webpages are typically already "optimized" for the web by the website's webmaster / web designer and would most likely not look as pristine as the print-ready publication version of the pictures and graphics

Acceleration may seem to be 2x or 3x faster most of the time (and maybe sometimes up to 5x) depending on whatever webpage you may be accessing

Note that the internet in general can still slow things down like if a router is down, or if a website is on the other side of the world, or if a database on the website is being accessed by a lot of people, or if there are simply too many people accessing the website that you are trying to get to

A dial-up web accelerator will not accelerate anything else like the downloading of MP3 music files or PC software files

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