pre-purchase Questions

[Saudx]

I have so many questions that I would like you to answer.

how many users the program can handle and does the number of users affects the speed and the performance of the programs?

is there an auto users generator so we dont have to add so many users manually?

How can I use msn massenger and yahoo messenger in the clients laptops?

there any problem in using peer2peer sharing programs like kazza?

when I purches the program do I download it or I'll receive it by mail or
download activating patch ?

is there any problem or settings for using voice chat or video confrance?

can we make a backup for the users database or is there an auto backup in the program?

is there free updates for the program ?

is there a counter for the users they can see to know how much time left
or warning before the disconnection?


where can we disable the following:
DHCP Server
DNS Server
IIS Admin Service
World Wide Web Publishing Service


when I write ipconfig/renew I get this message
" An error occurred while renewing interface Local Area Connection : unable to contact your DHCP server. Request has timed out."

when we deleted one of the users and he was online he still can browse
even when he restarted his laptop he still can browes that means there is no limitations for the users.

can we disconnect one of the users from the server while he is online?


thank you very much for your support
Saudx

[CyberiaWiFi]

I think I can help answer some of your questions as a 2.1 user myself for some months now...

You get a lisc key file unique to your machine only.

Yes, you can use p2p software. Firstspot lets you limit bandwidth globally or per user account. You can always have windows block certain ports if you want to restrict activity too on a global basis.

Firstspot has a built in DCHP server. its works very well. Clients must get their IP automatically from firstspots DCHP server.

There are users designed patches and plugins that i have seen that let you bulk create users.

You can use any network application thru firstspot if the user loggs in thru the web interface first.

There is a pop up disconect dialog box that also refreshes to show how much time a user has left on thier account, or if its unlimited.

They now have a plug in paypal support for users to automatically create user id's and passwords and buy time without your intervention...this feature i LOVE@!

We have had as many as 55 people online at once surfing and doing various things. The only thing that slowed down was our internet connections thru put. Our copy of firstspot runs on a POS emachines PC for under $350 and there are no performance issues what so ever.

It hasnt crashed once in six months since we started using the new 2.1 beta. It's very stable in fact.

I do not think you can kill a user while they are online, though you could set thier time to 1 minute perhpas and make it drop them asap perhaps?

Disableing network features is best done thru your adaptors network card properties. This is done under winodws xp, port blocking under networking. Ask Karl/Alan for more details.


Voice and video? Since FirstSpot allows all traffic, i dont see anissue with using it. You would have to setup those applications, but you would anyhow thru your router or firewall, etc. To my knowledge FirstSpot wouldnt need anythign special changed.

You could manually backup the suer database really easy. It's a simple DB file. We have ours stored remotely on our webserver off site and use the ODBC connector to grab data from it. Simple to do.

As for updates, they have been greta with us, but we are long time customers. I think you would have to ask them directly what they will charge, etc.

I have been very VERY happy with FirstSpot and its custoemr support. The best tthing about 2.1 is the paypal and bandwidth limitting ability. its stable, easy to setup and use and honestly the best deal for the money i have seen. I would recomend it to you highly.
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www.cyberiachicago.com

[alan]

Thanks CyberiaWiFi for the comment. In general, it is quite accurate :-)

Here is our answer:
1) Performance - FirstSpot is very efficent since it is not a proxy server. In fact, our internal benchmark test shows that the 100 Mb Ethernet Private Network Interface is the bottleneck rather than the machine CPU

2) Users creation - some of our customers create some scripts to automate the account creation process. See http://www.patronsoft.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=53 . In 2.1, we also support self sign-up feature

3) P2P, MSN, Yahoo IM, Video Conference - Yes, it will work. Since FirstSpot is not a proxy server, it will support all applications.

4) Purchase - Once you purchase the program, you will receive a license key to "unlock" FirstSpot

5) User backup - The user database is in a ODBC datasource. It should be quite easy for you to make a backup yourself

6) Update - If you purchase FirstSpot now, all 2.x will be free

7) In 2.1, you can view the "access minutes remaining" in InfoBox (a popup windows for the client). Currently, FirstSpot won't warn before disconnect the users.

8) The DHCP Server, DNS Server, IIS Admin Service, World Wide Web Publishing Service - are all Windows services which you can disable them in Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Services. Note that you might not find all of them if you have not explicitly install them from the Windows CD.

9) ipconfig/renew -> try to renew one more time, or try to ipconfig/release first then ipconfig/renew. The Windows TCP/IP sometimes timeout too soon

10) We do not recommend adminstrator to delete user when he is still online. Try only to delete them when he is logged out

11) Not exactly. You have to rely on the idle timeout features. If you set it to a small value (5 minutes), FirstSpot will kick that users soon after the client disconnect
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~ Patronsoft Limited ~