Modem dropouts and other problems

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I am experiencing modem dropouts at infuriatingly regular intervals for no reason that I can discern. The modem (internal) worked on win98, same line and everything like that, and it was working well on win2k pro (which is what I'm using now) for some time (maybe 2 weeks since I upgraded and installed win2k). Now the modem either dropouts after between 1 and 5 minutes or, as it is doing this time, doesn't drop out at all (well I expect it will in say 4 or 5 hours but my ISP has been kicking my connection after that long since I've been with them so that's the normal state of affairs). Does anyone have any ideas of things to check?

Related to the modem is an increased amount of really stupid error messages for sites along the lines of 'www.google.com could not be found' which can happen when I try to go to the site [google and others which I know aren't down or incorrect names, happens on board's o' magick when I'm on the main index page, so I know the boards are up, and I try to go to a topic I'm informed that 'sorcerers.net can't be found'], when I use the search function (on opera and/or firefox) or when I'm on the site and try to refresh it or search again.

This is happening on firerfox, opera, netscape, and *shiver* IE. If one tells me the site is down, even if it's obviously not, then the others also tell me it's down.

Again does anyone have any ideas of the causes of this?

I've run some adaware, spyware and virus scans and removed what I found (only adaware and spyware, no viruses detected) but it hasn't improved the situation.

 

Line noise could make the connection unstable - if you plug a phone into the socket you use for your modem and just listen to receiver, if there's any crackling or hissing you'll need to get the phone company involved, afaik.

You could try using a different modem, but it sounds more likely to be an issue with the ISP or phone line. If it isn't a WinModem (it really shouldn't be) then it won't be software. Try finding a different number (for the same service) to dial up with, or if you're on a flat rate try using an Xp/minute number.

It could sometimes be simply very heavy traffic on the ISP - Freeserve drops me if I'm on between 45mins and 1.5 hrs usually; I don't think I've ever been connected longer than 2.5 hrs. I also get the same 5 seconds or so of 'no response' from the modem every so often, where it acts disconnected and suddenly comes back to life. I think that's standard.

 

Something pretty similar happens to me irregularly. I am on dial-up however.
You really should check in your Task Manager if the connection really is working. The 2 computers icon should remain show both blank. This is why It cant find the sites.

I dont know why it happens but even though the computer says conected to the internet, that really isn't the case. This may even happen a few minutes after you have already been browsing. Disconnecting and connecting a few minutes later usually does the job.
I haven't bothered trying to find a solution as it's still a rare occurance.

If you have Zone-Alarm it should tell you instantly whether there is any traffic on your computer or not.

 

@ Shrikant

Yeah, that's the sort of dead time I was referring to... I don't know if it's worse with some than others, but I only rarely need to disconnect altogether. It usually starts working after a few moments, never more than a minute. If I do need to redial then it usually disconnects for me (i.e. the connection fails utterly.) That normally follows a few moments of 'dead time'.

Even so it falls asleep like that pretty frequently.