DSL & WinXP connection timeout problem

[terrie]

Does anyone running WinXP with a Verizon DSL connection have problems with what appears to be a timeout issue?

If I leave my system for a hour or so or overnight, when I come back, I can't connect to any web pages--basically, the status bar shows "resolving" and it eventually can't resolve the url...

My dsl modem (westell 6100F) lights are green ("internet" and "data" blink and "dsl" is solid green) and my ipconfig /all shows the appropriate info. Rebooting the modem doesn't help nor does ipconfig /release followed by an ipconfig /renew.

None of the settings in the Power Schemes are set to shut down anything--monitor, harddrive, network card, etc.

I don't have the system set to go to Standby or to Hibernate but I do have a screen saver set to kick in at 30 minutes.

I posted a query on the Verizon DSL forum at dslreports and it was suggested that I check the "failure" settings on the Recovery tab for DHCP and DNS Client Services and I set all of them to "restart" and set "Reset fail amount after" and "Restart service after" to 0 (zero).

That didn't help but I did discover that rather than having to reboot, I could stop and then start DNS Client Service and I get my connection back which is much quicker than rebooting.

Dslreports has a Verizon Direct forum in which Verizon techs will answer questions and I posted there and was told that:

"DSL provides your connection with an unique IP address and if there is no activity after an hour or so, it will give that IP address to someone else. This is called a Dynamic connection and is very normal with DSL."


I have asked what is supposed to happen after "losing" the addy but as I just posted today (saturday), I probably won't get an answer until monday.

From the way the Verizon tech worded the reply to my query, my impression is that I should not be losing my connection as I do even with a "dynamic connection".

It seems to me that something is timing out but I don't know what.

Does anyone else have this happen?

Thanks...

Terrie

[ktinkel]

Sure sounds like what I had with SBC (AT&T) DSL. I would come downstairs in the morning, find the connection broken (and often with lights suggesting the opposite), and it would take half an hour to an hour of fiddling around to fix it.

I never figured it out (or they were never able to explain it so I understood), so as you know, I gave up.

It’s good that you have all those resources — odds are you will be able to figure it out. Good luck with it.

[Michael Rowley]

Terrie:

"DSL provides your connection with an unique IP address and if there is no activity after an hour or so, it will give that IP address to someone else. This is called a Dynamic connection and is very normal with DSL."

I haven't an ADSL connexion, because I use cable, but that only provides an address for a limited time (usually 24 h); but the address doesn't vary often. I shut down my computer every night, but never the modem & router, and even though there's no activity on my part for many hours, there's occasional activity observable at the modem. But different IPs might have different systems for allocating addresses, especially if they haven't enough to provide every subscriber with a different address.

[terrie]

kt: Sure sounds like what I had with SBC (AT&T) DSL. I would come downstairs in the morning, find the connection broken (and often with lights suggesting the opposite), and it would take half an hour to an hour of fiddling around to fix it.

Interesting...I am pleased that I discovered that stop/starting DNS Client does the trick because it's quick fix...


>> It’s good that you have all those resources — odds are you will be able to figure it out. Good luck with it.

Yeah...I hope so...'-}}

Terrie

[terrie]

michael: I haven't an ADSL connexion, because I use cable, but that only provides an address for a limited time (usually 24 h); but the address doesn't vary often.

I never had this timeout problem with cable...

Both cable and DSL have a "lease obtained" and a "lease expired" (seen from within ipconfig /all) but these don't appear to be part of the problem as the values for both are "valid" even though I can't access web pages...

Terrie

[Michael Rowley]

Terrie:

Both cable and DSL have a "lease obtained" and a "lease expired"

If that is so, it would appear that the reason you were given (it's in the nature of dynamic addressing) was bogus. And no, I don't get many problems with cable either, and on the whole cable is the only sensible way of delivering broadband.

[Steve Rindsberg]

I think Michael's right ... their explanation sounds bogus.

I used to have to put up with something like this; originally our DSL system required you to visit a web page and log in before it'd work. After some period of inactivity, you'd be logged out. PITA.

Until the ISP saw the light, we used to use a "Stay Alive" type app to ensure that there was some kind of regular but randomized activity.

[terrie]

steve: I think Michael's right ... their explanation sounds bogus.

Yeah...I'm beginning to think so too and I added some info to my post to them...hopefully, I should get some sort of response tomorrow...


>>Until the ISP saw the light, we used to use a "Stay Alive" type app to ensure that there was some kind of regular but randomized activity.

Interesting...I thought that might be what was needed...I did find a post on dslreports of someone on xp having the same problem and he'd had DSL with w2k and not had the problem so I think it may be something specific to XP but I don't know what...

It's annoying but not so much that I'd cancel the service--I upgraded to their 3mbps plan which was a major pita and half that took an hour and 5 transfers which was just ridiculous...

I'm going to have to call them yet again because of course their email contact form is totally screwed up and you now don't get any response by using it--I have used it in the past and gotten a response so something changed. Anyway...I have questions about my first bill and about the upgrade but I figured that monday's are probably really busy so I'm going to wait until tuesday to call...ugh!!!--even with my special phone trying to navigate through their phone prompt system is just a nightmare...

Terrie

[iamback]

If it's really a matter of "no activity" for a while, you could set up a task in task manager to ping some server (like one of their DNS servers) every few minutes.

[Steve Rindsberg]

I used to do that or a variation on it. Apparently I wasn't the only one. Some ISPs worked out that that's what people were doing, and started to trap and ignore repeated pings/other identical request that came in regularly from the same source.

The little app I used after that would access various things randomly to sidestep that problem.