IMPORTANT- MichNet dialin: Upper Peninsula Locations

[Scott Gerstenberger]

*********************************************
Please remember that Merit has no way to send
email directly to end users. For that reason,
it's very important that you publicize info
like the following if it is relevant to your
dial-in users.   Thanks,  Scott Gerstenberger
*********************************************


IMPORTANT -- Big Bay, Escanaba, Iron Mountain,
             Iron River, Ironwood, Marquette,
             Menominee, and Sault Ste. Marie

On May 13, Merit announced new MichNet phone numbers
to replace our old numbers in the 8 U.P. locations
listed above. We are not aware of any ongoing issues
with users dialing the replacement numbers for these 
locations, so

 THE OLD MICHNET NUMBERS IN THESE LOCATIONS 
 WILL BE SHUT DOWN ON FRIDAY JULY 3, 1998.

The following information is needed by any users
in these areas who have not yet switched over to 
using the new numbers. Please distribute this
information as widely as possible. Thanks.

-----------------------------------------------------

MICHNET SERVICE -- Big Bay, Escanaba, Iron Mountain,
                   Iron River, Ironwood, Marquette,
                   Menominee, Sault Ste Marie

Merit is generally increasing our dial-in coverage area 
in the U.P., adding and consolidating lines so we have 
better ultilization (fewer busy signals), and getting 
ready to offer v.90 high-speed modem access. With these 
changes over the next month or two, 22 of the 26 U.P.
MichNet dial-in locations will support v.90 modem speeds,
a higher percentage than any other Michigan area code.

On April 27th, we announced the addition of 13 new 
locations in the U.P. Those locations plus the 8 listed
above form our new consolidated "UpperPeninsula" dial-in 
hunt group which initially can service 240 simultaneous 
user calls.

Although all 21 locations currently support v.34 modems, 
we expect to be upgrading to the new high-speed v.90 
modem technology within a month or so. Users who already 
have purchased a v.90 modem should temporarily disable 
the v.90 capability in their modem and use only v.34 
until Merit announces the activation of v.90.

We expect that v.90 will provide connect speeds for many
users of about 44,000 bps outbound from MichNet and v.34 
speeds inbound to MichNet, but performance will be highly 
dependent on the quality of the end-user's telephone line. 

Here is the list of the 8 locations and their old and new
phone numbers.

NOTE: THE OLD NUMBERS LISTED WILL BE REMOVED FROM SERVICE
      ON FRIDAY, JULY 3, 1998.


Location        Old Number  New Number
-------------   ----------  ----------

Big Bay          345-9622   345-9496
Escanaba         789-0057   789-2034
                                      Escanaba also covers:
                                      Bark River, Cornell,
                                      Gladstone, Rapid River
Iron Mountain    774-0145   776-1202
                                      Iron Mountain also covers:
                                      Channing, Norway
Iron River       265-3395   265-4810
                                      Iron River also covers:
                                      Amasa, Crystal Falls
Ironwood         932-0636   932-9914
                                      Ironwood also covers:
                                      Bessemer, Wakefield
Marquette        225-0222   226-3891
                                      Marquette also covers:
                                      Gwinn, Ishpeming, Negaunee,
                                      Sand River, Skandia
Menominee        863-3994   863-1002
Sault Ste Marie  635-0282   635-1533
                                      Sault Ste Marie also covers:
                                      Kinross

It's very important that all users switch to using the new 
numbers immediately so their use of MichNet dial-in is not
disrupted.

Please actively encourage your users in all of these areas
to switch over to the new numbers as soon as possible.

We have created a temporary email address for end users to
report telephone dialing problems associated with the use
of any of these new numbers. Although we have tested 
the new numbers thoroughly, there may still be scattered
telephone exchanges where calls to them do not go through
properly or consistently. The most common evidence of these
kinds of problems will be various recordings from the 
telephone companies, such as "all circuits are busy" or 
"your call cannot be completed as dialed". People who
receive such recordings or otherwise have trouble *dialing*
the new numbers may report problems to Merit by sending
email to updialtest@merit.edu with the following details:
 
     1. Date and time of the telehone dialing problem.
     2. MichNet phone number being dialed.
     3. Area code and complete phone number of the number 
        from which your call was attempted.
     4. The nature of the problem (busy signal, fast busy 
        signal, recording, etc.).  Please include the exact 
        wording of any recorded message you heard.
     5. Your name and email (optional).

The email must contain at least items 1-4 in order to be
processed.

Note that this email address should *not* be used to report
other kinds of problems such as modem connect speeds,
password failures, disconnects, etc. Those types of problems
should be reported in the normal way, i.e. through the
appropriate channels of the organization that issued the
user his/her MichNet AccessID.



Scott Gerstenberger
Merit Network