• Maintenance Changes to Early Morning Hours
  In an effort to improve our services to customers, NATCO is changing the Internet system weekly maintenance window to an earlier time each Wednesday. The new hours will be from midnight until 5 a.m. instead of Wednesday from 9 a.m. until noon. The change should result in even less interruption of customers’ use of the Internet.
   
  However, for those of you who use the Internet early in the morning, be aware that maintenance will begin just after midnight Tuesday and could continue until 5 a.m. Wednesday every week. If you experience any interruption with your service during this time, please try again shortly.

   

• Propel Accelerator Proves Popular
  Many of you are trying our new service - the Propel® Accelerator, NATCO Technologies Edition - and your reports have been very good. The Propel Accelerator dramatically accelerates delivery of Web pages to your PC. It works through intelligent caching and efficient compression with a patent-pending technology, and eliminates repetitious connections that your browser would make with each request to find a Web page.
   
  Retrieval times for Web pages have been shown to be up to five times faster than before a PC used  Propel Accelerator. Sign up by December 31 this year and we’ll waive the $10 activation fee. The monthly cost is $3.95 (in addition to your Internet access fee). If you wish to surf faster, you can do so with minimal additional expense. Call us with your questions at 1-800-775-6682.

• Winning E-Story Submitted by: Edith Prentice
  Having e-mail has been the greatest thing for me lately. Having moved here almost a year ago from Illinois, we are away from friends and family. I have received several e-mails of my grandson, and was able to see his "First Birthday" pictures on his birthday. Today, I became a Great-Aunt! I received Pictures of my Great Niece a few hours after she was born. Thanks for the service, NATCO!

• Edith Prentice just earned two free months of NATCO Internet service! Submit your E-Story today and you could be our next winner! Remember that you can enter more than once. So, if you didn't win this time, try again! Just go to www.natcotech.com/estories.htm and tell us how using NATCO's Internet or e-mail service has made your life easier, helped you promote or manage your business, or simply how much you enjoy using the Internet and e-mail. If your E-Story is chosen, you'll win two months of free NATCO dialup Internet service ($19.95 x 2 = $39.90) or an equivalent credit on your DSL or ISDN account.

• Useful Web Sites
  If you are interested in the creativity shown by some of today’s Internet leaders, try peeking in at this site: http://next.yahoo.com. They invite your comments about what could become the next big development on the Internet . . . and the next . . .

 

• PCs Need Double Firewalls
  
  To protect personal or financial information on your computer, technical experts advise you to combine the methods of stopping intruders (like the Trojan viruses) with both hardware and software firewalls. A recent article by computer technical columnist Kim Komando outlined how firewalls work and made some recommendations.
   
  Hackers’ programs seek out IP addresses of PCs and infiltrate them. Hardware firewalls protect your computer from receiving information you did not want by letting only your requested information through the firewall. But, the problem increases when you download a free program or an e-mail attachment that requests information without your knowing it. A hardware firewall will not stop that because you (due to the program you don’t know is on your computer) requested the information.
   
  A software firewall is then needed. It alerts you to attempts to access the Internet with a pop-up message. If it’s a valid program, such as your browser or e-mail program, you allow the attempt.  If you don’t recognize the name of the program seeking access, you deny it and then look it up on the Internet, Komando said. Several companies market software firewalls that are free for personal use, or you may purchase firewall software from leading anti-virus companies. Also, remember to keep your anti-virus programs working and updated in combination with any hardware and software firewalls to keep computer hackers out of your computer.

• Holiday Internet Gift Certificates Available
  Helping you plan your holiday gift giving is on our list of things to do before Christmas. What’s on your shopping list? Gift certificates for all the digital services of NATCO Technologies and the advanced telephone services of NATCO, from high-speed Internet to Personal Ring/Teen Service, are available. So, put on your thinking cap, strike up a conversation with your family members who use the telephone and the Internet. Then, call our Santa’s helpers - NATCO’s  customer service representatives. You may also check for ideas at Services on the www.natconet.com  Web page or the Services page on www.natcotech.com for details about what is available.
    
• Weekly Maintenance on Wednesday
  Each Wednesday morning from 12:01 until 5, NATCO Technologies performs regular maintenance on Internet equipment. Your Internet service should not be affected. But, if you do experience an interruption in service during this time, please try again a few moments later. We try to minimize any "down time" by doing our maintenance at a regular time each week.
   
  All users agree to terms and guidelines published at www.natcotech.com/guidline.htm.

Feedback: NATCO invites readers' comments about the e-newsletter and suggestions for future articles. Let us know what information in the e-newsletter is most useful or what Internet issues are important to you. Readers may send suggestions for future e-newsletter articles, questions or comments to: custserv@natconet.com.

NATCO Technologies does not endorse or recommend any software or program. The purpose of the articles included in this newsletter is to keep our customers informed. We do not provide free technical support for software or programs such as Norton, McAfee, AVG Anti-Virus, Instant Messenger Services, etc. Please see the NATCO Internet brochure for full details on what is and is not covered by our free Internet Technical Support.