Problems with Earthlinks PPP access

[Jason]

Firstly, let me make it clear that I never chose to conduct business
with Earthlink Inc. Earthlink seized control of my Mindspring account
over a year ago, including the email address I used at mindspring... 

Lately, more and more often, the server on the remote end of the
Earthlink system is flat-out refusing to identify itself with a valid
IP address. Of course, this makes pppd crash and burn after sending
the error message (in text) "Unauthorized remote IP address" back to
Earthstink's system. Then my end hangs up...

This is only a problem some of the time, which leads me to believe
they've got a few bastard systems hanging around in their cabinets or
something. Anything that can be done on my end to force their system
to behave correctly (doubt it.. but..)

Lately, however, its not resolved itself in a few minutes - it took a
few hours last night. Its the middle of the night now (10PM), and the
hold time is averaging 15 minutes _anyways_ ... these peoples customer
service is CRAP compared to what I was used to with Mindspring...
Nevertheless, I feel a deep need to at least yell at someone, so I am
writing this while I listen to classic music (violins and shit, not
talking 80s rock heheh). I'll send it if or when I ever get back
online.

Earthlink should have sent everyone who was forced to migrate to their
service a speakerphone. My ear hurts.

Now both ears hurt. (I switched a while ago, its been way more than 15
minutes.)

I think I'll take a stab at just disabling IP authentication if I
cannot convince the technician that a problem exists. Only one
phoneline free in this house though, and sacrificing my painfully
earned position in the hold que is a non-option. Besides, this song is
better than the last dozen or so. Im not sure if this opens any cans
of worms or not. Anyone?

It just occured to me.. is the current average hold time really 15
minutes until you speak with a Live Technician(tm), or is that the
average time people wait before bailing out because theres actually no
one there at all right about now?

Hey, I heard a click!

Their CD player must have reset - Ive heard this song before. Its the
one with a single out of place note that sounds suspiciously like the
Windows 95 default error chime. I wonder if they inserted that. Or
maybe its the new Microsoft On Hold? Do they sell that? From what I've
heard about MS support, they've probably made one.. do they sell
copies? They probably do, and Earthlink would eat something like that
up...

Hmmm... How long do I have to wait to speak to a DEAD technician? I
promise I'll be seriously impressed if he or she is able to speak
back, even if they cant help me. Unless they really arent dead.

38 minutes and counting here. 30 to be fair, and allow for dialing and
navigating their automatic operator.
slick:~$ ls -l /tmp/ppp-raw 
-rw-r-----    1 root     root         1345 Jun 17 22:42 /tmp/ppp-raw
slick:~$ date
Sun Jun 17 23:19:49 MST 2001

I am twice as stubborn as the average victim, who hung up long ago.

If only I had bought a DVD player, I could have watched half a movie
by now.

OK - its 23:34 and Im done. I reported the problem to them, and have
obtained two alternate access numbers that connect to physically
different machines. When I get stuck at the stubborn machine in the
dialing rotation, I can try another server. The technician said he'd
send a note to a supervisior with what I had told him about their
systems sending an invalid IP address, along with the time and dialin
number I used. Hopefully the machine I connected and logged into will
be in their logs, and they can figure out what is wrong with that
sucker.



-- 
jkenner @ mindspring . com__
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