Our History
Frazier Mountain Internet Service began operations on December 1, 1995 when we acquired our initial connection to the Internet over a 28.8 modem. At that time, we brought up our first server and had 3 dial-in phone lines. During our first month, we invited a handful of friends to use our service to help us work out any problems before we opened up to the general public.
On December 31, 1995, we finished setting up our first Portmaster PM2ER terminal server and brought up 10 incoming phone lines as well as a 128K Frame Relay connection to the Internet. On that day, we began offering dial-up internet service to the Greater Frazier Mountain community - providing for the first time the opportunity for local residents to access the Internet without paying for long distance charges.
Since that time, we have enjoyed the support of the Greater Frazier Mountain Community and have continued to grow our operation. We now have 2 terminal servers, 40 incoming dial up lines, several ISDN lines for dedicated connections and emergency backup connections, a full T-1, high speed wireless access and more. We currently provide Internet access to over 400 local families, Frazier Park School and several local businesses. We also provide co-location services to the Rootsweb Geneological Data Cooperative (the premier web site on the Internet for geneological research), and for Immediate Computer Access (developer of high quality Domino web sites and messaging technology development). Additionally, Frazier Mountain Internet Service hosts web sites for a number of our clients including Ace Hardware, Jennings Better Homes & Gardens, The Kiddi Show, Knute Johnson Web Page Design Service, LegalTel, Lone Juniper Ranch, Mountain Communities Chamber of Commerce, Mountain Properties, the Newfoundland Club of Southern California, Noller Signs, Pine Mountain Realty, Prime Communications Sites, Sophtec Water Conditioning Systems, Tejon Ranch, and others.
Our Goal
Our goal is very simple. We strive to provide the highest quality of service and reliability to our customers. To that end, we take great pains to ensure that we have redundant systems wherever possible, ample bandwidth available, and extra phone lines. Additionally, we have implemented advanced technologies like our proxy server to ensure that our customers enjoy the fastest possible Web Surfing (http) and Downloading (ftp) performance.
As an example of our committment to quality, in our first 19 months of operations, we have had a grand total of about 2 hours that all of our phone lines have been in use (and, therefore, a customer could have gotten a busy signal during those periods. The other 13,678 hours, we had phone lines available to receive your calls - i.e., no busy signals..
As part of our committment to quality, we don't leave our customers to set up their Internet connection themselves. While many of our customers are quite capable of setting themselves up (and a few of them choose to do so), we believe that most people don't have the expertise to ensure that everything will be working optimally. Consequently, when we setup a customer, we go out to their home or office and configure their dial-up connection, download and install software as needed, and verify that everything works correctly. While we're there, we also provide introductory training so that our customers aren't left wandering around the Net without a clue about what to do! Most Internet Service Providers charge a setup fee comparable to ours (its $25.00). The difference is that we actually do something for it!
Our Future Plans
We are committed to keeping on top of developing technologies so that our customers will continue to enjoy their Internet experience. To that end, we will be starting testing of a Cable access system during August 1997. This testing will be done in cooperation with Mountain Cablevision, and we have very high hopes that we will be able to bring cable access to the hill communities before the end of the year. With this system, we anticipate that our customers will realize speeds well in excess of 10 times modems speeds (i.e., greater than 300k).
As we proceed forward, we will always keep in mind our primary goals. We appreciate your business, and welcome your feedback....
Happy Surfing!