Grandparents, computers, Catalunya and the Internet - help!

[paulie-mafia]

For some reason I've become my grandparents' personal IT manager. Everything's good at home in the UK, but they spend 3-4 months a year in the Catalan region of Spain and I've just come back to a voicemail from them asking if they can talk to me about getting the internet out there on their Apple iBook.

So, does anyone know what the easiest / cheapest solution is. I'd suggest that they just find a cheap local broadband provider and get hooked up properly, but it would go un-sed 9 months a year A local or international per-minute dial-up service is probably best.

Any thoughts / recommendations?

Cheers guys!

[HiRich]

My parents have a local (Portuguese) dial-up to access their UK mail account. They are low users, and split 6 months each UK/Portugal, so free dial-up is fine.

An alternative is to check their UK host. They may have a local partnership (probably dial-up) as a bolt-on extra to their UK broadband account. Demon have this, though it is really for commuters, and frustratingly expensive. And as you say, it might be cheaper to just have two broadband accounts, one for each residence, particularly if broadband prices in Spain are cheap.

Whatever you do, make sure you set up and save the Network settings in System Preferences, so swapover is 2 clicks away. Also give them 'muppet' instructions (where to make mods, what text should appear in each box) on how to modify the Spain settings when they are out there. And suggest they find the local Apple Spain outlet or a friendly local computer shop (worked for my parents).

HTH

[paulie-mafia]

Aha, good idea! Checked their UK ISP (Onetel, now part of TalkTalk), and they don't offer international dial-up, so Telefonica or one of the other Spanish offerings it is!

Cheers!