Dial up Difficulties

[nareshc]

Have subscribed to the NTL £15/month deal which provides freen internet access. All was going well until 16/1/04, when suddenly I was unable to connect using 0800 5190100. At first I thought it was just cable lines being busy, tried Sunday,monday I rang supp't line, tried various things, still no joy. Tuesday spoke to Ricky who said he'd call me back but did not. Wednesday I rec'd a call from Ricky who then called again when I returnd home. Spent over an hour with Ricky going through various menus checking all was correct, eventually we deceided to down load latest modem drivers and re-install windows 98. Haven't been able to get hold on Ricky since and still unable to connect. Anyone out there got any clues

[paulyoung666]

hi and to the site , just out of daftness have you tried plugging a phone into the socket to make sure the extension is okay

[Stuartbe]

Originally Posted by paulyoung666

hi and to the site , just out of daftness have you tried plugging a phone into the socket to make sure the extension is okay

I sugest you follow pauls advice first. If you are on a bt line and you have 1571 enabled it will give a broken dialtone. To a modem this is a line fault and most modems will refuse to dial.......

Saying that --- I thought that the dialup number changed recently when NTL launched a new dialer package ?

[Sociable]

Welcome to NTHW nareshc.

As suggested try plugging a phone into the same connection you are using and dialing the 0800 number to check it actaully connects.

Also make sure the phone line has not been set to withhold caller ID as this will result in the call not being accepted.

If that is working then listen to the modem as it dials and make sure you can hear that bit.

You haven't said which specific error you get when you do try to connect so giving us those details will also help identify the possible specific cause.

I'm sure between us we can help we just need a few more clues to help us help you.

[fazer]

Forget about it - get a different ISP. The old 0800 number is discontinued for access since moving over to the FRIACO system. It should direct you to a page that will tell you to install a new dialler which dials the new number (0808 9909877 - you can use this without installing the dialler), but even that doesn't work anymore. However, I wouldn't bother since now you cannot get on in the evening unless you have a lot of time on your hands as its permanently engaged between 5:00pm and midnight. It seems that ntl in their quest to cut costs and corners haven't seen fit to pay for enough access to satisfy the number of customers they have. Don't bother trying to contact customer services - they won't help you (or even acknowledge that there is even a problem).

[st-clares]

I disagree with Fazer. I installed my dialup manually after I had some problems with my computer bringing up windows saying I was not on line when I was.
Since the manual dialup instal I have occasionally had to redial but it usually connects the second time. I have had no other problems whatsoever. Pages load at the normal speed for a 56k modem. My connection speed is usually 50.1 Kbps, which I think is pretty good and my dowload speed is usually 3.5-4.0 kbytes/sec
Unfortunatetly my location is not going to be uprated to broadband for some time, therfore I am stuck with dialup.
I have found NTL Freedom to suit my needs, I get free Internet connection and my monthly telephone calls are approx £10-£14.

[paulyoung666]

Originally Posted by fazer

Forget about it - get a different ISP. The old 0800 number is discontinued for access since moving over to the FRIACO system. It should direct you to a page that will tell you to install a new dialler which dials the new number (0808 9909877 - you can use this without installing the dialler), but even that doesn't work anymore. However, I wouldn't bother since now you cannot get on in the evening unless you have a lot of time on your hands as its permanently engaged between 5:00pm and midnight. It seems that ntl in their quest to cut costs and corners haven't seen fit to pay for enough access to satisfy the number of customers they have. Don't bother trying to contact customer services - they won't help you (or even acknowledge that there is even a problem).

sorry mate but where do you get your info from , it seem snonsensical to me to say a number is the one that should be used but then go onto say that this doesnt work either , i apologise if i am being thick here but what the hell are you going on about

[fazer]

Originally Posted by paulyoung666

sorry mate but where do you get your info from , it seem snonsensical to me to say a number is the one that should be used but then go onto say that this doesnt work either , i apologise if i am being thick here but what the hell are you going on about

What don't you understand? Its the right number - it just doesn't work, its permanently engaged in the evenings. It seems to me ntl haven't leased enough FRIACO capacity to cope with peak times. I'm sorry, but if I pay for unmetered access, I expect to be able to use it. Having said that, it has been much better the last few nights - it only took 5 redials to get in tonight.

The problem has only occurred since migrating from the old 0800 number to the new FRIACO number.

Re-reading nareshc's original post, I'm surprised to notice that he says the old 0800 number stopped working for him on 16/1/04. It stopped for me way back before Christmas - at least a couple of months ago (and I've had nothing but trouble since). Maybe its a geographical thing. Is anybody still able to use the old number?

Its always a good sign when tech support will spend ages going through your configuration and installing new dialler software. Thats going to stop the line being engaged

[st-clares]

As I said previously, since installing my dialup manually I have had few problems logging on.
Maybe it is a geographical problem.
Maybe a few comments from other parts of the country might indicate where there are connection problems.

[TBH1]

I live in the Birmingham area and have been having major problems for about a week - - I email ntl but no response up to now. Couldn't get on at all on Thursday or Friday, got on for 10 minutes on Saturday and about the same on Friday - - at greatly reduced speed, maybe 21 -22000 - - I'm not used to real fast speed . 40000 if I'm very lucky but mor elike 34000, so 21000 taking the prverbial methinks. This week not quite so bad, though do get a lot of 'line busy' messages and 'port diconnected, hardware failure' - -also disconnects every 5 minutes or so.

I get no such problems when using tiscali or btopenworld pay-as-you-go but hey, pay £15/month for anytime and anytime is what I want.

Just my 2 penneth

[Neil]

Originally Posted by TBH1

<snip>

I am presuming that you can't get either ntl or Telewest BB where you are 'TBH1'?

[TBH1]

Neil, you are right, I can't get ntl or telewest broadband in my area; in fact I have only just become aware that I am in a BB area now, was enquiring about the tiscali £15.99/150 package and was informed that although I am in the £19.99/250 or £24.99/512 area, I cannot use £15.99 one.

Spookily enough, I am signed-on ntl right now, and have been for 30 minutes without a hitch - - - -only 36000 speed though but still on - - -

[Toffeeman]

Originally Posted by fazer

Forget about it - get a different ISP. The old 0800 number is discontinued for access since moving over to the FRIACO system. It should direct you to a page that will tell you to install a new dialler which dials the new number (0808 9909877 - you can use this without installing the dialler), but even that doesn't work anymore. However, I wouldn't bother since now you cannot get on in the evening unless you have a lot of time on your hands as its permanently engaged between 5:00pm and midnight. It seems that ntl in their quest to cut costs and corners haven't seen fit to pay for enough access to satisfy the number of customers they have. Don't bother trying to contact customer services - they won't help you (or even acknowledge that there is even a problem).

Yep, my experience as well. Took me 15 attempts to get a phone line at lunch time to check email, and this evening took a lot more...

No-one said this was going to happen, it just did.....

Rob

[fazer]

I had a feeling that it had got a bit better the last few evenings, but tonight its absolutely appalling. Its now 22:18 - I've been trying to connect since 8 o'clock. What's really annoying is I've been trying to do something else but needed to install a bit of software to do it. Software needed a few seconds to register it before I could use it... there goes the whole evening wasted again

Whats really annoying is tonight I'm getting a new error message...instead of saying the line is busy, it says "the modem or computer I'm trying to connect to is faulty"