Modem lock damaged?

frivolous_fay

I've just installed I don't know how many years worth of Windows updates on an old Toshiba laptop - including SP2. The reason the owner has been ignoring the prompts is that she's on dialup. (ugh)

Anyway... we got the machine up to speed, fixed the audio device driver which clashed with SP2... but now it won't dial up. on restart, BT's horrible built in software pops up a message about the modem lock being damaged, or the BT configuration being incorrect. When you try to dial, it says that the modem is in use, or not configured correctly.

Based on the above... is there anything I should try, (as I'd like to send it back functioning better than it is now, rather than with no net connection) or should I just resign myself to sending it back and telling them to run their BT software again?

TIA...

frivolous_fay

The exact message is:

WARNING:

The Modem Lock configuration or BT Yahoo! Internet installation is corrupt - re-install the dialler

espresso

Simply create your own DUN and remove the BT dialler.

frivolous_fay

Ok... let's assume it's not my machine (as it's not) and I don't want to remove anything they're used to using.

espresso

Let them reinstall their precious BT dialler then, as it's their ISP. Personally I never ever install any ISP's software, as it better to do it yourself and you know exactly what been installed.

Electron_2

Hmmm, the warning is screaming out for the original BT internet installation disk.

The Modem Lock is protection from rogue premium phone number dialers, you could try disabling it.

Double click on the BT Internet desktop icon. In the 'Connecting to BT internet window, click on the 'Configure' button and select 'Configure Modem Lock (Modem Protection)' tab from the drop down menu.

This wil open up the 'BT Modem Lock Configuration' window.

Here, untick the option 'Enable BT Modem Lock for modem protection '(recommended)'

Click on 'Apply' and click on 'OK'

The above steps should disable the BT Modem Lock.

My only other idea is to use System Restore, and thats not 100% guaranteed to get back a internet working laptop, and lose all the work you've done updating it.

Hopefully someone else can nail this problem more efficiently.

superscaper

espresso wrote: »

Let them reinstall their precious BT dialler then, as it's their ISP. Personally I never ever install any ISP's software, as it better to do it yourself and you know exactly what been installed.

When you want to shoot yourself in the foot you have to take the consequences which includes rubbish badly behaving software and drivers.

superscaper

To be honest how clean is the laptop considering it has been open to almost every vulnerability known to man every time it was connected online?

frivolous_fay

superscaper wrote: »

To be honest how clean is the laptop considering it has been open to almost every vulnerability known to man every time it was connected online?

Considering it took me nearly 2 days to do the updates, I haven't yet mustered up the enthusiasm to do a full scan, and the lappy is going back tonight.

I'm choosing to be optimistic about its malware condition, as the owner is a conservative net user. Not very savvy, perhaps, but unlikely to have a high risk pattern of usage.

other than never doing any updates :rolleyes:

superscaper

frivolous_fay wrote: »

Considering it took me nearly 2 days to do the updates, I haven't yet mustered up the enthusiasm to do a full scan, and the lappy is going back tonight.

I'm choosing to be optimistic about its malware condition, as the owner is a conservative net user. Not very savvy, perhaps, but unlikely to have a high risk pattern of usage.

other than never doing any updates :rolleyes:

Well I'd be amazed if you didn't find anything malicious. I've personally seen a pc get infected within minutes of going online (to legitimate security sites of all things) just because it had the firewall down.

Might even be worth doing a slipstreamed disc and just reinstalling from scratch.