Disconnections and Staying on the Straight and Narrow(band) 

You're just surfing along happily when all of a sudden you get disconnected. Or maybe 30 minutes into writing an e-mail you lose everything. These are frustrating moments to experience. My first reaction is usually to blame the dial up provider, but it’s not always their fault. There are many potential causes for disconnections, so I’m providing a long list of them here.

Noisy phone lines:

When you make phone calls on this line, do you hear static? If so, your computer may not be able to make a good connection to the server. You'll need to contact your phone company about this issue. Sometimes they can install filters on the line to reduce noise.

Check your Internet Options settings

If you are using Internet Explorer, follow these steps:

1. Open up IE
2. Click on Tools --> Internet Options.
3. Choose the Connections tab at the top
4. Choose settings.
5. Click on Advanced.
6. At the top of this window it should say “Advanced Dial-Up”.
7. Make sure that “Disconnect if idle for (20) minutes” is UNCHECKED and that “Disconnect when connection may no longer be needed” is UNCHECKED.
8. Click OK 3 times to exit the Internet Options menu.

If you use Microsoft Outlook to check your mail

1. Open up Outlook.
2. Click on the Tools menu
3. Select Options.
4. Choose the “Mail Setup” tab at the top.
5. At the bottom of this window, make sure that “Hang up when finished with a manual Send/Receive” is UNCHECKED.
6. Click OK.

If you use Outlook Express

1. Open up Outlook Express.
2. Click on the Tools menu
3. Select Options.
4. Choose the “Connection” tab at the top.
5. Verify that “Hang up after sending and receiving” is UNCHECKED.
6. Click OK

Update your drivers

If your modem drivers are out of date, then it can cause many problems. Go to your manufacturer's website, or contact them to find up to date drivers.

Modem Speed

Sometimes your modem is set to run at speeds that are not possible and this can cause disconnections.

If you are using Windows XP:

1. Open your Control Panel and make sure you are in “Classic View”.
2. Double-click on Phone and Modem Option.
3. Choose Properties in the lower right-hand corner.
4. Choose Modem tab at the top of the window.
5. In the middle of this screen you should see “Maximum Port Speed”. If it is set to 115200, then change it to 57600.
6. Click OK until you exit back to the Control Panel

If you are using Windows 95/98:

1. Open your control panel.
2. Open Modems.
3. Click on Properties.
4. Where it says “Maximum speed” change 115200 to 57600.

When your ISP will disconnect you

If you are idle for 15 minutes

In order to prevent the idle disconnect, have something run in the background that uses your connection (Outlook Express will look for new e-mail every few minutes, so this works well).

When you are connected for 4-6 hours

The disconnection every 4-6 hours is to prevent one user from hogging resources and typically cannot be avoided.

Call Waiting Disconnects You

If you have call waiting enabled on your phone and you are disconnected whenever you receive a phone call, then you'll have to temporarily bypass call waiting. In front of the dial up number, type “*76” without the quotes.

If none of these work, or you prefer someone to walk you through this over the phone, call into tech support. They should have access to your connection logs. They can see the time and general cause of your disconnection. For example, they might see that your computer seems to be disconnecting normally, so it is probably a setting/bug on your computer. If the connection is lost, then something between your computer and your ISP is causing the issue.