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The Black Box
P.O. Box 2999
Sugar Land, TX
77487-2999

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Technical Support Questions
  • What are the phone numbers for dialing in to The Black Box?
Phone numbers:
Houston PPP:    713-638-9983 (56000 baud and ISDN)
Galveston:         409-763-7182 (56000 baud and ISDN)
 
  • What are the Metro numbers for dial-up access if the above numbers do not work? (try these ONLY if the above numbers don't work)
Phone numbers:
Richmond-Rosenburg:    832-586-0522 (56000 baud and ISDN)
Pinehurst:                        832-479-0522 (56000 baud and ISDN)
Clear Lake (NON-Houston access):
                                     281-480-2686 (56000 baud and ISDN)
Splendora:                      832-793-0522 (56000 baud and ISDN)
 
  • What are the protocols, domain names, and server IP addresses needed for dial-up access?
Protocol: PPP with VJ Header compression
Domain name: blkbox.com
Domain name servers:  207.91.130.4 and 207.91.130.6
POP and SMTP mail server:  blkbox.com
Usenet News (NNTP) server: news.blkbox.com
 
  • What other information do I need to know?
If you are using Windows 95 you should go through the Internet Setup icon in the control panel, then go to Start/Accessories/Dialup Networking and use the right mouse button to open Properties on the blkbox.com icon.  Hit the Configure button and then the Options tab and then set 'Bring up terminal window after dialing'.  Close this with OK, then go to the Server Type button and turn OFF all the buttons on this page EXCEPT the bottom one, TCP/IP.  Hit the TCP/IP Settings button and click Specify name server addresses.  Enter 207.91.130.4 as the primary and 207.91.130.6 as the secondary.  Close this window and all the other Properties windows with OK and you are ready to go.
 
  • What do I do if I still can't get it working?
If you need additional information to set up your account you may call us in the evenings or on the weekends at 281-480-2684.   We will be more than happy to assist you configure your software.
 
  • How do I create a web page?
If you need additional information on creating your web page, you may call us in the evenings or on the weekends at 281-480-2684 or 1-888-798-8182   We will be more than happy to help you figure out how to get the web page working.   However, we are not web site consultants, and we will not help you develop your web site for you.  If you are interesting in a web site consultant, please check out the cool folks at Mena Designs, who put this web site together for us!
       
Historical Questions about The Black Box
  • When did The Black Box first come about?
The first incarnation of the Black Box came about in 1981, when it was begun as a BBS on an Atari 800 with one 360k floppy and a 300 baud Hayes modem.   How's that for high speed access?
 
  • What other historical facts are there to know about The Black Box?
The BBS pre-cursor to The Black Box ran on CPM for 10 years and Fidonet for 3 years!
 
  • When did The Black Box get connected to the Internet proper?
In 1992, the domain name "blkbox" was registered and customers began signing up for Internet access.
 
  • How many modems are in use by The Black Box?
We started with a whopping 5 modems and now we're fixing to have over 250 modems in 6 cities (Houston, Galveston, Tomball, Splendora, Clear Lake, and Richmond/Rosenberg)
 
  • What hardware does The Black Box use?
Without giving away all of our secrets (we are The Black Box you know! - you're not supposed to know what exactly IS in the box), we can say that we have Sun servers running Solaris and Apache and we use Ascend V.90 modems.

Last Updated: September 14, 1999
Copyright 1998, The Black Box.  All rights reserved.
Please send any questions or comments to www@blkbox.com.
Web site design by Mena Designs.

  

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