OK, first of all, I’d like to say that I begrudgingly resign myself to the fact that I must spend my entire summer browsing the web on a 56k modem (after spending a year in college on a lightning-fast dorm network). All I ask is that said modem work correctly.
The phone cord connecting this modem to the jack is about 25 feet and one of those thin “low-profile” types. I first got suspicious when I’d try to connect to the internet and it’d say that there was no dialtone. I pick up a phone to confirm this–sure enough, no dialtone. I go to every extension in my house, searching for an off-the-hook phone…nothing. After about 10 mins. of trial and error, I disconnect the phone jack from the modem. I pick up a phone and, sure enough, I have a dial tone again.
30 more mins. of trial and error. Now what I’m doing is holding a cordless phone to my ear to confirm that the dial tone exists WHILE I PLUG MY PHONE JACK BACK INTO MY MODEM. Sure enough, the dial tone is there. I stay on the line, listening for dialtone, while I try to connect to the internet. I hear nothing but dialtone…yet my comp still says there is none. 5 seconds later, without fail, I lose the dialtone on the cordless.
I really don’t know why the hell this happens. It happened when I first got my modem…then it mysteriously disappeared. Now it’s not going away. Is it the phone cord? The modem? The way I’ve got it set up? Please elucidate, SOMEBODY.
1 plug your cordless into the cord - make a long call see if it cuts out.
2 haul your computer over to where your cordless phone pulgs in and try it there.
I personally think your modem is toast (60% confidence level with a 35% chance of wiring trouble and a 5% chance of another phone causing the trouble.
Sounds like a loose wire in your phone jack that is giving you problems. Pop the cover off, if it has v-notches that you stab the wire between, head to the store and purchase a jack that has nuts to wrap the wire around. You may have to check all the jacks in the house.
OK, some other stuff I forgot to put that is relevant.
(a)The phone I was using to test the dialtone was itself plugged into the PHONE jack in the modem. So I know that the dialtone at least gets to the modem.
(b)The last time this happened it was on an entirely different phone jack.
These two things, I think, confuse the problem even more.
I’ve had this happen to me several times over the years. k2dave is correct your modem relay switch is most likely toast. Mew modems are $ 25 or so at Staples et al. Get a new one and see if the problem goes away. I’d bet a beer on it.
Have you tried putting the phone line into your computer(IN jack) then plugging a phone into the phone(OUT- might have a pic. of a phone next to it)jack, just to see if the telephone connection will go through the modem?
K2dave, yes, the modem in and out are correct. It’s the way I’ve always had them.
Astro, my modem is about a month old. My computer (a less-than-a-year-old Dell) didn’t come with a modem (didn’t plan on using one at school so I didn’t get one), so I purchased this one quite recently. It’s a USRobotics 56k Performance Pro. It’s not even one of those crappy winmodems–I sprung for the real thing, hardware and all.
Wishbone, that’s exactly what I descrbed doing in my second post.
Re your system being new, unfortunately age is to some extent irrelevant when it comes to modems. One of the largest causes of modem deaths is telephone line voltage spikes and the newest modem is no more immune to these than the oldest.
Well, the verdict is in, and I’m pissed off even though I got it to work.
The problem is that the two jacks in the back of my modem are mislabeled. The one with the picture of the phone jack should go to the extension, while the one with the picture of the phone should in fact go to the wall. I can’t decide whether I’m an idiot for not at least trying to switch them until about an hour ago OR I’m perfectly sane to rule out the possibility that those jacks might perform entirely opposite functions.
Bottom line, I never thought my modem was toast. But I’m wondering…I never noticed that they ewre backwards before and I’ve had the modem for a month. I must be nuts.
Thanks for all the help. k2dave nailed it, though at first he said my modem was dead…
