Am forced to use a dial-up connection (live in Desert Center, CA, and
little else is available. And, at this point, am using AOL.) When I
unplug the phone plug from the phone and into my laptop and try to log
on to AOL, more often than not I don't have a dial tone. And, of
course, after a certain length of time, I start getting a "you have
taken too long to make your call; please hang up ..." message. What can
I add to the initialization string to force a 'hang up' justprior to
the modem dialing so that I DO have a dial when the modem tries to
dial.

Is there a better solution?

( Or is there an AOL guru out there who will have a better solution for
me?) (And, SO far, I've been unable to get better than 24K bps out of
these horrible phone lines out here: Verizon)

Computer is an Averatec 3200. WinXP. Modem: Smartlink 56K modem;
driver date 8/29/04, ver. 4.0.5.874

Christopher

casteele95thbgheavy@yahoo.com wrote:
> Am forced to use a dial-up connection (live in Desert Center, CA, and
> little else is available. And, at this point, am using AOL.) When I
> unplug the phone plug from the phone and into my laptop and try to log
> on to AOL, more often than not I don't have a dial tone. And, of
> course, after a certain length of time, I start getting a "you have
> taken too long to make your call; please hang up ..." message. What can
> I add to the initialization string to force a 'hang up' justprior to
> the modem dialing so that I DO have a dial when the modem tries to
> dial.
>
> Is there a better solution?
>
> ( Or is there an AOL guru out there who will have a better solution for
> me?) (And, SO far, I've been unable to get better than 24K bps out of
> these horrible phone lines out here: Verizon)
>
> Computer is an Averatec 3200. WinXP. Modem: Smartlink 56K modem;
> driver date 8/29/04, ver. 4.0.5.874
>
> Christopher
>


Might not even be the computer's fault...rural telephone lines
have a higher probability of issues. Have the quality of the
phone line checked, and then the internal connections. Use a new
connection between the computer and the phone jack, preferably a
4-conductor one.