Can't connect to broadband OR dial-up!

woj101

I've had a Tiscali broadband connection for nearly three years. Not perfect but not too bad, but recently have been experiencing frequent drop-out and sometimes struggle to get the adsl modem to re-sync so that I can re-connect.

Went away for a few days last week and came back to find the pc behaving a bit odd – monitor wasn’t recognising that it was plugged in and some usb ports weren’t recognising something plugged in. And the adsl modem was failing to find a broadband connection.

The other problems have gone after a reset or two, but I still can’t connect to my broadband. So instead, in order to try and diagnose the problem I reverted to dial-up, but this isn’t connecting either. The modem dials the referral number, it says it’s connected, then before it downloads the list of ISP providers the connection drops – every time, and I’ve even tried dialling-up using a laptop – still the same.

I’ve rung BT to see if there’s any issues with the line, but my phone is working fine so they’re not interested. I can’t see why my phone works but I can’t even get dial-up. The only thing I haven’t tried is to try a different socket – I’ll do this later today.

Nothing in my setup has changed so far as I know for the entire 3 years I’ve had a connection at this home, so can anybody suggest what may be the problem/solution?

Many thanks

liquidlives

You know, I've been using Tiscali for over five years and I have recently had the most frightful disconnection problems, which is rather odd. I tried e-mailing them about it and they have escalated my problem to the second line engineers or something.

Regarding what you're experiencing, I once had a similar problem, without having changed anything on my PC and so I updated the router drivers and this sorted everything out. It turned out that my router had decided to go a bit funny and the driver got corrupted. Very odd indeed.

woj101

I've considered there being probs with the network adapters but nothing is shown as wrong in the device manager, and besides, I've tried connecting a laptop using 20th century dial-up and this doesn't work either.

I've since tried the laptop connected to another socket within the home and it gives the same result - says it's connected when I try to setup a new dial-up account, but then fails before downloading the list of ISPs to choose from.

I can't figure what could prevent connection by broadband or dial-up but doesn't stop the phone from working.

woj101

... and for what it's worth, I've tried using a Restore point from a date the internet was working but still got nowhere. If I've installed a Windows update that somehow caused a problem, wouldn't the roll-back remove the latest windows update?

fwor

You don't say anything about which firewall you use, but could this be yet another manifestation of the now infamous ZoneAlarm vs Windows Update conflict?

Inactive

I suspect that your problems will be related to Tiscali, contact them for help, I know that their support is not the best, but you shouldn't be paying for a non-working connection.;)

woj101

Don't know anything about Zonealarm problems. I just use the Windows XP firewall. My windows updates are automatic so I can see how there's potential for conflicts to arise unseen, but as mentioned above, I've tried using a restore point and it hasn't changed things.

I've emailed Tiscali, so no doubt will be on the receiving end of their woeful call centres soon, asking me if I've reset the computer and if I'm using any filters.

Thanks for the input. Keep it coming if anyone else has other suggestions.

woj101

Getting quite desperate on this now. Tiscali are supposedly looking in to it - they said there was an issue at my exchange and that they had trouble sorting it, but they say they're done but the problem persists.

Is there anyone with any know-how re. phone lines and exchanges? I can't figure out what would prevent connection to BOTH broadband AND dial-up, but the phone line still works. I've tried using other filters (that I know work) and still no go. Been a month now. Need internet. Can't. Live. Withou....

woj101

No. I've looked in the device manager and everything asppeared ok. I'm a bit nervous about trying to re-install it cos I don't know if it's going to ask me for a non-existant disc.

However, one thing I do have is a second installation of Win XP on my second hard drive. I've booted that version and still had the same problem. Isn't a network adapter problem going to be related to drivers rather than hardware - therefore I'd have thought the drivers would be ok on my second OP.

However, as I say, I'm desperate, so I'll give it a go. Ta.

Inactive

I would dump Tiscali, they are notorious for not helping their customers, a decent ISP would have sorted this ages ago.

woj101

It' s defo not the Network Adapter. I have uninstalled and re-installed it and no difference, and I keep forgetting, I've tried connecting via a laptop as well, so I know it's not my PC.

I can now get online with my 56k dial-up modem. I don't whether it's because something's been fixed, or because I've tried a specific ISP number rather than the ISP referral number, but I'm online at dying snail's pace of 37.2 Kbps.

So I suppose it could in fact be a fault with my adsl modem, which I haven't been able to check yet. But how it would develop a fault I don't know cos it just sits there.