Recent MSN Upgrades Causing Modem Problems? 63
swm asks: "My father-in-law runs Windows/XP on a low-end machine. He gets internet access through MSN over a 56K dialup. This worked OK for many months. Two or 3 weeks ago, MSN presented him with an auto-upgrade, and he clicked OK, and the system has been virtually unusable ever since. I booted the machine to see what it does. First, it thinks he is on a LAN (he isn't) and presents a window telling him it can't connect to the internet and he should disable his firewall. I dismiss that window. A few seconds later another window pops up and tries to dial out. I can cancel and close the dial-out window, but it just comes back in about 15 seconds and starts dialing out again. No matter how many times I cancel and close the dial-out window, it just keeps coming back. I reboot the machine and let it dial out. It connects to MSN. I click the 'Offline' button, but it doesn't drop carrier. I shut down the machine and it still doesn't drop carrier. Finally I pull the power cord out of the wall socket and it drops carrier. I've checked msn.com and Googled around a bit, and I can't find any mention of problems like this. Does anyone have any idea what is going on?" Have any MSN users experienced this problem? What have you done in your attempts to solve it?
Have you called MSN? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Have you called MSN? (Score:4, Insightful)
And if they can't/won't, drop thier asses for a worthwhile ISP like Earthlink, Worldnet, etc.
Re:Have you called MSN? (Score:2)
It seems you've never had to deal with Worldnet's "customer service." I wouldn't exactly term them a worthwhile ISP.
On a happier note, Earthlink it indeed excellent.
Re:Have you called MSN? (Score:2)
Re:Have you called MSN? (Score:1)
I wondered for a long time about the line drops that were happening, then after noticing the logfile realized I just needed a different ISP.
Re:Have you called MSN? (Score:1)
Re:Windows XP and 40 GB HDDs (Score:1, Offtopic)
Re:Windows XP and 40 GB HDDs (Score:2)
Honestly though, I can't imagine every 40 GB hard drive being unusable for XP. My dad has XP and I'm pretty sure it's a 40 GB disk.
Re:Windows XP and 40 GB HDDs (Score:1)
Re:Windows XP and 40 GB HDDs (Score:1)
Re:Windows XP and 40 GB HDDs (Score:1)
I tried followings but no success
1)http://www.microsoft.com/technet/treev
2)http://www.computing.net/os2/ww
Re:Windows XP and 40 GB HDDs (Score:1)
dial on demand? (Score:2)
Calling home (Score:4, Insightful)
I've got a question though. Why are you even using MSN software? Why not just enter the phone number and create the connection yourself? Windows certainly doesn't need more software to establish a simple dialup connection. Get rid of the software and don't worry about it.
Re:Calling home (Score:1)
find a suitable "restore point" in XP (Score:3, Informative)
This page decribes How to Restore Windows XP to a Previous State [microsoft.com].
Potential Solution (Score:3, Funny)
(:
msn (Score:1)
That sounds vaguely familiar (Score:1)
Somewhere either He went wrong or a virus he previously contracted decided to get naughty. Did almost the exact same thing. I ended up booting the damn thing up in Safe mode and disabling his modem, dialup prompt, internet related drivers and everything so that I could see what the hell went wrong.
Strangely, a quick runover with McAffee and ScanDisk did the trick. I checked the logs and didn't see anything corrected. I just re-enabled everything and all was fine.
I would personally just check your settings, if that doesn't work than go through and reinstall your modem and protocol drivers. Mind you all this should be done in safe mode.
WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
Has ask slashdot turned into a fscking software problems/bug report board?
Ask the fucking support department of MSN for god's sake.
Please be a little more selective; job ads, hormones, wtf news for nerds? - you're better than this guys...
Yeah (Score:2)
Re:WTF? (Score:2)
Has ask slashdot turned into a fscking software problems/bug report board?
Please be a little more selective; job ads, hormones, wtf news for nerds? - you're better than this guys...
Yeah, what do you think this is, Fark? [fark.com] Next we'll have stuff like "Photoshop this Star Trek convention to add Lego LotR characters."
Re: (Score:1)
Red herring? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Red herring? (Score:2, Informative)
connections (Score:4, Informative)
Section B - Dialing in: The software has apparently become configured to auto-connect whenever there isn't a connection. I find that setting to be useful, but I don't have buggy windows software trying to dial home to return the error message saying there is no LAN. If you edit the network setting directly in Windows you should be able to fix this.
Section C - Not Hanging Up: Yes, modems can be quite sticky. If you really want to make them hang up on eachother, pick up the phone and blow on it, or unplug the phone cord from the wall. Some modems keep power flowing to the line which keep the connection alive. Blowing introduces noise, which convinces the other modem to hang up, while disconnecting the line disconnects the power.
There is a very important lesson here -- Your ISP is not your software vendor. Use none of their proprietary tools, and never auto-update. Mature, stable, solid tools for creating and maintaining TCP / IP connections exist and are readily available, and integrated email / internet solutions can be built with a little creativity and without programming anything.
-C
Re:connections (Score:2)
MSN, like AOL, is not just an ISP. They are a content provider, and have many features which go beyond simply establishing a TCP/IP connection to the Internet. While many /.'ers find that amusing, or absurd, the fact is, most ordinary people actually like those additional features. The new MSN's child-safe stuff shows real promise, and the ability to share a browser session with someone else is downright cool.
I wouldn't want all that stuff, but I've got friends and relatives who do, and none of them are lame-brained idiots.
Re:connections (Score:1)
As for the original poster: sounds similar to something my brother was going through. No idea if he cleared it up. I told him I wasn't going to trouble-shoot his computer unless he got a real computer (he got a Dell, dude) and a real ISP.
Re:connections (Score:2)
Re:connections (Score:1)
I ask purely in the interest of science, you understand.
Setting up a Manual Connection (Score:5, Informative)
Since MSN shares their access lines with other ISPs you have to specify which you are using by doing the following.
Use for the username: MSN/username
and then the password is the same
And of course, the access # you can get from the software itself or by going to msn.com and looking up access numbers in the search box.
So once again to recap:
Phone #(access #)
username: MSN/username
password: password
Chris
www.talkingtoad.com
Also-to-note: (Score:3, Informative)
If you build a manual connex, MSN isn't going to use it unless you specify you have "another ISP".
In the bad old days of MSN 6/7, you could repop it with CTRL-shift-F8, but I don't know if that works anymore...
WE will help you (Score:1)
We will fix your problems.
Isn't Upgrading MS Products Always a Risk? (Score:2)
And you expeccted something different from a Microsoft upgrade?
With all the things you mention, the one thing you never said you tried was calling tech support. Why not try that?
After all, it's an MSN problem. MSN should fix it. (But then again, they'll probably tell you that you should be running XP on a faster machine and it's time to upgrade.)
It's little things like this (Score:1)
Windows can help.... (Score:1)
XP (Score:1, Troll)
Tell your dad to make the switch and use Mac or Linux or anything other than XP. To all those windows XP fans, all I can say is I'm sorry, but I have heard NOTHING good about XP and this is just another nail in their coffin.
Re:XP (Score:2)
Ha-ha. Now you won't be able to use that "I have heard NOTHING good about XP" line ever again.
Re:XP (Score:1)
Re:XP (Score:2)
You yourself said, "I won't be running it on my servers anytime soon", so why should anyone spend the 2-300 dollars on Xpensive XP????
Re:XP (Score:1)
A good reason *not* to use internal modems (Score:2)
Re:A good reason *not* to use internal modems (Score:1)
Re:A good reason *not* to use internal modems (Score:2)
Making XP tolerable (Score:1)
NEVER install any of the updates. Run a stock install. There are only three 'problem areas' that you need to worry about, and MS's patches never fully address those anyhow!
Get a cheap firewall (In my case the windows machine is behind my freebsd box so it's not an issue) and block off new inbound connections on all the low ports. If you're paranoid you can configure it to dialog all new connections in both directions, but that gets annoying fairly fast!)
Remove IE (well, hide it..), and replace it with the most recent Mozilla. Or Opera.
Remove Outlook and replace it with a more secure mail program. I use Pegasus, but there are others.
If you're worried about viruses it might be a good idea to install a virus scanner. And running AdAware occasionally is a good idea, if only because things like Gator and Bonzi make your machine unstable and slow. So far it's not been a problem; my kids (6 and 8) mostly just go to nickjr.com (Blues Clues) and bbc.co.uk (Tweenies, Teletubbies..) and don't install games or click on the ads.
Set to auto-dial a connection (Score:1)
IN SOVIET RUSSIA (Score:1)
OK, sorry. I had to try.