Two isp's one house?

[pompalomp]

//Redacted

[Funkstar]

Sure, but you need another phone line.

You can only have one ISP on one line. In the dial up days you could continue to use the newnet email by paying for that service, but actually use a seperate ISP to connect to the internet. Wastefull, but possible. You can't do this with ADSL.

The other more important question is why does your dad not have his own domain for his business?? then he can change his ISP without changing email addresses.

[pompalomp]

//Redacted

[0iD]

ADSL is broadband.

BT should be able to install a second line with minimal fuss, there's normally deals for that sort of thing so check out BT's website. I think it cost me something like £70+vat.

Also,as Funkstar says, your dad should register a domain & get an instant mail account, check out someone like 1&1 123-Reg. Then he can use either account or use webmail should he prefer.

[Funkstar]

Or depending on the business, he could get a Windows Mobile phone or a Blackberry and have instant access to his email through a mail hosting company. I recomend www.simplyms.com. I have an online Exchange server with them and it's awesome.

Does your dad have a fax line in the house as well? He could get another internet ISP on that line instead of installing another one.

[pompalomp]

//Redacted

[watercooled]

Getting a new phone line installed would involve physical installation, yeah but at least you'd be getting some new copper for your connection!
Yeah you could have 2 ISPs no problem, provided you have 2 lines as mentioned before.
You could use a dual WAN router if you wanted to share both connections (and therefore bandwidth) between everyone but that's not what you want to do so in your case it would be best to have 2 separate ones so the connections are separate.

[Mblaster]

So does installing a new phone line mean action being taken e.g. digging a hole or somthing

BT will come out to install it, but they won't need to dig anything up (at least, didn't need to for me when installing a 3rd phone line to the house). They just run the wires through the existing holes along side the current ones.

Would we need a dual wan router?

The easiest way is to have 2 different routers, then your Dad could connect to the current one, and you could connect to the new one, keeping things separate. I thought dual WAN routers were for things like fail-over or load balancing.

[b0redom]

Re: getting your own domain, you can register a domain for not very much (a few quid), and have it pointed at gmail.com. Gmail will pretend to send emails from your domain. You could also have the ISP email pointed at gmail.

The above setup is what I use for all my business emails. I can't be bothered running all the infrastructure for a couple of mailboxes, and it gives me secure web / phone based access too.

[DaemonLee]

Re: getting your own domain, you can register a domain for not very much (a few quid), and have it pointed at gmail. Gmail will pretend to send emails from your domain. You could also have the ISP email pointed at gmail.

The above setup is what I use for all my business emails. I can't be bothered running all the infrastructure for a couple of mailboxes, and it gives me secure web / phone based access too.

Also, if you have it pointed at gmail for mail, you can redirect it to a different webhost for web.

A purpose behind this would be: if you like the feel of gmail, and not the current "online" mail options that your webhost provides you with.