The heartbreak of technology
It is an internet connectivity trifecta:
- The phone company configured your DSL line wrong.
- The new DSL modem supplied by your ISP was a dud.
Your brand-new Airport Extreme wireless router does not work. It’s under warranty, but to get it replaced, you must endure another hour-long session with Apple technical support. You’d rather chew off your own leg.(Update.)
It’s really a fourfecta. The phone company fixed the DSL line, but didn’t tell the ISP. They didn’t even tell their own service technician. Dude showed up to fix a line that wasn’t broken. You wonder what the guys in his Anger Management class had to say about it.
Two and half weeks into the void, a light bulb moment: Maybe it’s the modem. ISP sends new modem, you get your speed bump.
But only when you plug directly into the modem. For your new Airport Extreme wireless router cannot find an IP address even when you enter it manually. Indeed, this remarkably attractive piece of technology cannot be configured in any meaningful way. It cannot even restart without hurting itself.
You read that the new Airport Extreme works great. Alas, there was one lemon in the production line. You got the lemon. Trifecta.
Two faces
You tell PC users you bought an Airport Extreme because it was time for a new router, and Apple computers work best with Apple routers. Besides, Apple has that whole 802.11n thing going. That 802.11n is just so much better than the outdated spec they’re using. They just wouldn’t understand.
You tell Mac users you bought an Airport Extreme to replace a perfectly good third-party router, because OS X 10.4.x is semi-incompatible with third-party routers. All too frequently, one of your OS X 10.4.x Macs becomes unable to find a wireless signal sent by your ancient Linksys router.
You didn’t have to buy the Airport Extreme router. You could fix the compatibility issue by adjusting a setting on the old router. To do so, go to Fresh Kills, dig your old G4 tower out of the landfill, boot into Virtual PC, and log into the old router.
Can’t find the old G4 tower in the landfill? Buy an Airport Extreme. Apple makes it. Their stuff just works.
Support
The Lithium Woman in Apple Technical Support was unable to suggest anything beyond restarting the hardware and sticking a pin in the Reset hole—things you tried many times before breaking down and calling Apple. Why this tech support call took an hour is a mystery. Why it is called “support” is a more profound one.
At the start of the call, you said all you needed was help accessing the Manual Configuration panel to type in the WAN I.P. address, because for some reason the Manual Configuration Panel would not load. But the Lithium Woman made you plug stuff in and unplug stuff and turn stuff on and off for an hour. It was the stuff you’d already done, and you explained that, but that’s how tech support works, so you did it.
At the end of the hour, having sufficiently atoned for your sins, you again asked for help accessing the Manual Configuration Panel, as you needed to type in the WAN I.P. address, and the Manual Configuration Panel just wouldn’t load.
The Lithium Woman said you shouldn’t have to type in an I.P. address.
Impasse.
After a while, feeling bad for her, you offered her a face-saving way of ending the call without having helped you.
You figured, once your new DSL network was set up, your Airport Extreme router would just work.
But let us pause
Most readers stopped after the first paragraph. A few hardy souls made it all the way here. Thanks for sharing the journey.
Die-hards will want to suggest solutions. For them, a few details.
Automatic setup and manual configuration both end in “please try again” error messages.
The router freezes and crashes without ever connecting, suggesting that the problem is software based. We’ve wiped Airport Utility off the hard drive with App Zapper, removed preferences, reinstalled from disk, and run Software Update to download and install the latest version. That kind of reinstall usually does the trick. Not this time.
Resetting the device with a straightened paper clip is the only thing that briefly lets you access Manual Setup. You enter the IP Address, Subnet Mask, Gateway (Router), and DNS Servers. You verify the data. The device restarts itself. You bite your nails. The software congratulates you. You open a browser. You are not online. And you can no longer access or change settings. Unless you restart the device with a straightened paper clip.
Nothing works. You are the proud owner of a piece of modern art. The object is beautiful, but it has no heart. There is no network, no nothing. George and Martha. Sad, sad.
Filed under: glamorous, industry, Tools
70 Responses to “The heartbreak of technology”
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That puts paid to me buying my Dad an Airport Extreme to go with his Apple TV. Ridiculous. I have had problems with Apple Tech support too recently: They made me go through a 40 minute charade resetting power management and holding key combinations to ensure the dead superdrive in my MacBook Pro was really dead, then told me there was nought they could do unless I could test it for them on my OS X install discs, some 200 miles away. I called back, lied, they made me repeat the process (incase anything had changed in the 16 hours between calls), and they picked up the computer. They had it for five days, fixed by Thursday and it was shipped back Monday (their courier, unlike any other in the world, doesn’t work on weekends, they claimed). Turns out they didn’t fix the Superdrive at all. No discernible changes to the case, superdrive, hardware signatures, anything. I’m almost certain they left the same one in there. I seem to remember you being deeply, deeply unlucky with Apple products in the past, Jeffrey. I hope this one gets ironed out for you, and I Feel Your Pain.
It’s broken. Call Apple, tell them it’s broken and ask for a replacement.
I wish there was something like a universal “Yes-I-Have-A-Pulse Tech Support Gold Pass” or some such. A little certification you could flash that magically allowed you to bypass the obligatory, “Is it plugged in?”, “Is it turned on?”, “Are you a ing idiot?” gauntlet every tech support line makes you dance to. As for suggestions, I’m stumped. Sorry.
Are you getting the amber light? Airport Extreme (802.11n): Base station displays a blinking amber light (LED)
Also, one of those is it plugged in? questions (just-in-case), you’ve plugged the line from the DSL modem into the WAN port, not one of the LAN ports, right?
Sounds dead to me. It probably just adds to your pain but my Airport Extreme (which I also just had to have) was dead easy to set up. Hopefully next time you get someone there who’s been hit by the clue stick.
When I have to call support and I’ve exhausted all options prior to calling I just fake the stuff I’ve already done.
Support – “Can you restart the device?”
Me (2 seconds later) – “Okay it has restarted”
Typically they don’t even care enough to understand that you’ve just waited a few seconds and told them you did what they asked. This saves all the mind numbing hours of your day that you’d rather not loose.
It doesn’t sound broken. It sounds like the configuration takes hold and then your computer is no longer on the same IP subnet as the base station. Something gets setup and then the BaseStation Utility thinks it’s there but it’s not. The base station, perhaps, does not pass out IPs to the internal network at all? Perhaps the base station is passing out IPs for a different subnet than the IP your computer remains on?
Try setting the base station up and then manually assigning the information to your computer. Then try connecting to the base station. That might be it…. *I hope*
Hmm. This is nothing new with most tech support – they can’t afford to hire the really smart guys and I’m sure they aren’t allowed to stray from the script either. It’s a mess.
I’ve inadvertently ended up with high-level techs at Apple in short order the few times I’ve had to call them. I would hypothesize that this happened because I’d politely and carefully explain my problem in a way that went over their head.
No matter what, I try to be thankful and friendly, even when the other end of the line is not. I guess I want that Karma. Then, I usually start rattling off tech terms like “capacitor” or saying things like “The Tachyon pulse was inverted to prevent the network packet from entering Ensign Crusher’s ear! After that I couldn’t get an IP.” OK, so that last bit was a joke, but you get the idea.
Basically it seems that if one uses language that shows that you really know what you’re doing, the low-level support foks are usually more willing to pass the problem on to a higher level of support where things move much more quickly. It’s something about language and your experience showing through that, plus luck in whomever you call, how much they know and fear, etc. Talk over their head without being snotty about it if you can.
I’m surprised that they can’t tell that it’s probably broken and you need another one. If that doesn’t work you’ll know it’s something else and so will Apple. Seems like this would be better for everyone and would likely not waste as much time.
I had been thinking about getting one of those new “N” routers, just so I could pay the extra $2 for the extra fast software. But then I considered the probable configuration headaches and decided against it. Lucky me!
However, I do have a suggestion that will end (or extend) this tale of woe. Go out to your local Apple Store and get a couple more of those routers, and make it clear you’re going to bring them back if they don’t work, plus the one you already have that doesn’t work. You won’t feel like you have to invest too heavily in any one of them (ruling out lengthy re-support psycles)s and you will multiply your message to Apple when you return all 3 defective routers, or as you have convinced me to call them through this sad story of your travails “whatchamacallits”. Even though I read your blog, we all know Apple don’t, but they do track hardware returns. Cheers!
Computers
Benefit: reduce work by 100%
Unexpected side-effect: create 200% more work
Sadly enough, Dell’s corporate support actually does have the “I have a pulse let me past tier 1 support kthxbai” option. There are a series of tests you can take, after which you become authorized to direct-order replacement parts and get directly connected to clue-endowed folk.
Whenever I have the need to call tech support, I always start the call the same way:
“Hi, my name is MM and I’m a computer consultant. I’m working with a client and their machine is having this problem:”
This is almost always a lie, but sometimes this convinces them to believe I’m as smart of them and have already tried Turning it Off and On Again.
Ah, I had almost the same experience, losing two weeks as the ISP (usually SUPERB for support) fought the phone company who actually own the DSL switch (always dismal service there).
http://www.community-media.com/wordpress/?p=244
It was me who finally said enough is enough and insisted that they send me a new modem. Bang- everything fine. I could go on and on, but the story tells itself.
I am a long-time reader of zeldman.com so I know history will support me in this:
You are not unlucky with hardware — you have a singular talent. One worthy of inclusion in an episode of “Heroes”.
I would suggest moving away from the equipment, possibly outside the building, and let someone else reset the router when it is free from your field of influence.
@George Girton: If you buy the new Airport Extreme with 802.11n support, it comes with a fancy disk that has said firmware & software update for your fancy new MacBook or MacBook Pro.
If you don’t buy the Airport extreme but still want to use the 802.11n capabilities of your laptop, only then do you have to pay the $2 for the cd. (Which really just barely would support the development of the software on the cd, the cd packing and manufacturing itself, and the admin overhead that apple accrues for needing to even have such an extra.)
Walker Hamilton said:
On those rare occasions that I’ve been able to access the configuration pane, the base station shows the I.P. address of the old SDSL network to which it is not connected.
The base station does not show the I.P. address of the new ADSL network to which it is connected—even though I have manually entered the I.P. address of the new ADSL network into the base station many times.
Each time I manually enter the I.P. address of the new ADSL network into the base station, the base station verifies that it has accepted this setting. Then it fails to connect. Then the access configuration pane becomes unavailable. Rinse and repeat.
The old SDSL network is still active on the same phone number, but off a different physical connection, and with different I.P. and router addresses. It plugs into a pre-September 11th cable modem, which in turn connects to the WAN port of a Clinton-administration-era, still perfectly functioning Linksys router.
Via the old SDSL connection, the old cable modem and old Linksys router are able to supply a slow but steady wireless network connection to the other Macs here. If the old SDSL connection were to be turned off, or if the old cable modem and Linksys router were to be disconnected, there would be no connection to the other Macs, because Apple’s router cannot synch to an I.P. address and thus cannot deliver a wireless internet connection.
I will have the ISP switch off the old SDSL connection as soon as the new connection is hooked to a usable wireless router.
Rather than waste more hours trying to make a broken router behave like a working one, or trying to convince a low-level technical support person that I know what I’m doing and the problem is with the hardware they sold me, I’m going to buy a different brand of wireless router and plug it in here.
Man, wasn’t there a recent entry about your DSL line being old and crufty, made of chewing gum and spit? And … you’re using a fixed IP address?
Apple stuff or no, troubleshooting is a flow chart. Apple stuff or no, things can go wrong. Stuff breaks. The center never did hold worth crap. Sure, the guy on the other end of the line may say, “I tried that,” but who knows what he or she did, really…
I feel your pain, Z, and hope DSL sun shines in your back door someday, all the way to the bottom and back up again.
Well, I’m not even going to suggest a fix. You are the one who always finds the problems, and the lemons always fall in your lap when it comes to tech stuff. This Perfect Storm of coincidences could only happen to you, my friend. I say send it back to Apple too :(
“Hi, my name is MM and I’m a computer consultant. I’m working with a client and their machine is having this problem:”
I use to work tech support, and almost always the people who said something like this, or bragged about being an IT professional are the ones who didn’t turn on said device, or didn’t plug in the cable. No offense, its just a funny thing.
@Zeldman,
Why dont you cut out the middle man ISP and go straight through verizon? It’s their stuff anyway, and it would eliminate dealing with some of the headache. I switched a while back, and the phone compay guy came out, installed everything, synced everything, and had my computer online in a few minutes. Just a thought.
I’d like to make a suggestion for anyone stuck in the “is it plugged in?” hell that is tech support. Before the tech has a chance to speak, do the following:
- Briefly describe the problem you’re experiencing.
- Tell them you’ve been through the tier-one tech support rigmarole.
- Tell them you’d like to be immediately transferred to tier-two support.
Be sure not to pause. If the tech has a chance to interject, you’ll be stuck wasting another hour in tier-one. Don’t stop until you’ve requested tier-two support. If the tech refuses, ask to talk to their supervisor. If they still refuse, hang up and get another tech on the line–one who will transfer you to tier-two.
Companies don’t waste anyone with actual technical knowledge on tier-one support. Tier-one is for solving the majority of problems, which are simple enough to be fixed by following a script. That’s why they never deviate from their script: they don’t know anything more than what’s on their screen. Tier-two techs actually know what they’re supporting. If a tier-two tech can’t solve your problem, they’ll generate an RMA without question. (And you’ll never make it to a tier-three tech for something as small as a router, so don’t bother trying.)
The problem with this system is that companies don’t want you to talk to tier-two techs. Tier-two techs are relatively expensive, so the fewer calls get sent to them the more money the company will save. That’s why you usually have to ask to talk to someone on tier-two.
Asking for your call to get escalated usually helps, front line support is just there to screen out the easy problems.
Wireless routers seem to be the great equalizer in the hardware/OS wars. I’ve struggled with wireless issues across Apples, Dells, HP, XBoxs, OS X, Linux and Windows and I’m a fairly technically knowledgable guy. I feel your pain.
I’m surprised no one has suggested this, but just go outside and walk down the block until you find an unsecured WiFi network. Login and Enjoy! The City is your oyster. What could be easier?
if it’s available in your area, maybe it’s about time you join “the others” and start using cable modem, usually requires one company, one modem, one connection…. when something goes wrong, one technician to fix all…
for me DSL sounded complicated from the get go… the phone line, modem, configuring, ISP and all… so here I am with cable modem… it has been about 5 yrs…
cable modem died about a year ago. time warner technician showed up with a new modem two days later and i was back in business…. i used my neighbor’s wireless connection for two days with his permission…
Just a suggestion for getting better support from Apple:
Genius Bar. You’re in Noo Yawk with plenty of Apple Stores. Bring your laptop and extreme station to an Apple store and make a reservation with a dude at the Genius Bar. I’ve found that it was far less frustrating, they’re much less automatons than the folks on the other end of the phone. Worth a try; even when they come to the same conclusion as you, it’s much quicker for them to swap it out for you than to wait for shipping.
Ha, I like your new writing style Jeffrey. The last four or five posts have had me coming here regularly again…
I think I’ve purchased my own fair share of useless computer stuff too (I have a joystick that I bought which apparently only works on about 1 computer in the world and then there was the Billion Bipac Modem month similar to your own).
Step 1: Get hammer
Step 2: Go to quiet corner
Step 3: Sit on floor until comfortable
Step 4: Play with hammer and modem until relaxed
Step 5(Optional): everyone go out for an icecream on the corner…
Good luck with it :)
listen, i’m telling you. i had the same problem. i use a mac, and i had verizon dsl with an old airport. I bought a new airport and plugged in it, but it wouldn’t green light. i made call after call, and verizon said, “we don’t support apple routers.” so i plugged my modem DIRECTLY in to my computer and called again. that’s when the lady told me that verizon dsl service maintains a 6 hour dhcp lease for whatever device is connected, and during that time it will not connect with any other device. she told me to wait a couple of hours and it started working. i also read this advice later on a forum about verizon dsl and heard it once techTv. i too, thought my airport was broken, but it was just verizon.
Just a note to the readers, please don’t throw your old computer components away, they need to be recycled through responsible agencies. While there is a chance that the stuff you put on the curb will indeed slip through and poison the water of future generation of Staten Islanders, it’s more likely it will end up poisoning the water of people in the developing world instead, where even without that, they have problems of an entirely different order than wireless speed bumps to begin with.
I’m wondering about your NIC. Often, a new router demands a new NIC. I think of it as a kit, at least with off-the-shelf stuff anyway. You need to buy an Airport Extreme Card.
Seriously, can you tamper with a NIC’s speed negotiation (auto/half/full duplex) on a Mac?
Wow. What a pain in the ass.
I’m glad you posted this. My do-it-yourself PC has cost me almost as much in replacement parts as the original and the next time I buy I want to just be able to call someone else and let them deal with it for me. I’ve been on the verge of buying a Mac because I assumed the support was as good as I’ve heard the product is but apparently not.
@andrew
Agreed. Finding reputable ones is the tough part. Recommendations welcome.
@kingpixel:
Thank you for sharing that. Verizon provides my phone line but is not my ISP, so I may or may not be affected by the unpleasant policy you’ve described. I’ve bought a third router and will plug it in as soon as I get some downtime. If it works, the problem was a bad Apple router. If it fails—especially if it fails the same way the Apple router failed—then there’s still a service problem. In that event, following your lead, I’ll go away for a few hours and see if the router connects.
@Stephanie:
I’ve rarely needed Apple tech support for my Macs; when I’ve needed it, it has been good. This was an unusually frustrating experience, in the middle of a bunch of frustrating experiences that have nothing to do with Apple. The router problems are merely the third leg on a tripod of pain.
My installation of the New Airport Extreme for my Mac went very smooth, it was a huge improvement from the previous Airport network. I’m still on 802.11g but very satisfied. My PC laptop works great with the wireless network as well. As for third party wireless routers, my Asante router worked great until I plugged in the wrong power adapter.
Jeffrey, I have nothing useful to say except Good Luck, I’m pulling for you.
To use the clever wordplay from a current TV spot, Connectile Dysfunction is going to affect us all one day… and it always seems to happen when you have a hot “date” you really want to keep. Our startup went through a three-week ordeal with a parade of phone company employees/trainees that had us perplexed. It did make for a humorous blog post after the fact, Routers, Redbacks and Switches, Oh My! but it hurts to think about the time we wasted. Jeffrey, you’d think you were due a few karmic credits to avoid these trials.
Solution: Don’t use Apple products. They suck. Especially the $pod and the $phone. I have a plain old PC and it works flawlessly. Even in airport.
Sorry “Mac” users. Deal with it.
I’ve been reading lately about the Airport Extreme and many of the problems it has had. My old white Airport went down and I wanted to know whether the Airport Extreme or the Airport Express (a cheaper unit) was suitable for my needs. What I read on the Apple Airport forum really disturbed me. Mostly for two reasons.
First, I was alarmed that so many people were having connectivity issues with the products. I’ve used Airports for probably all the time Apple has been making them and NEVER had a single problem. It sounded to me as if quality control had gone haywire.
Second, and most perplexing of all is that fact that the Airport Express I purchased has worked FLAWLESSLY the entire time since purchasing it a month or so ago. In essence I had the little unit humming along marvelously and suddenly run into all this bad press about the thing and am dismayed because I had no idea such was the general experience with it that most folks are really bummed out.
Pray tell, what is going on here? It would seem that either a batch of these things has been loosed upon unsuspecting folks or gremlins are afoot.
I still have got a preference to buy stuff in a physical store downtown. When ..err.. *things* like this happen, I wrap up the hardware, go back to the store, tell them my complaints, am being told that I am doing something wrong and then wrinkle my nose and ask innocently “Ok, then SHOW me how it is done” and 15 minutes later I am out of the store with a brand new box in my hands.
Helpdesks are worthless customer annoying non solutions all of the time, so I just refuse to use them.
In defence of Apple: I had my share of non-working hardware and extended repair programs, but thanks to the physical store they have always repaired my stuff; my iBook even 4 times, without asking difficult questions. So far, my Apple stuff has been as good or as bad as electronical and mechanical equipment from any company, but their service has actually been a lot better.
Issues with Verzion and DSL seem to be universal. friend just bought a Mac and had a devil of a time getting it to interface with Verzion DSL. BTW We live 750miles from you! I’m a PC owner and Just pluged my new Linksys router and it just worked.
I’m seeing a new “I’m a Mac I’m a PC” commercial here….Have a good weekend :-)
Echoing the Steven Clark theory – mightyless mouse. I can easily imagine extending this to other Apple hardware, it’s reliability is a myth. Luckily I have a Linksys router.
I have had problem after problem with linksys routers and tech support. I get the same questions,.. is it turned on? is the cable plugged in? Turn it off for 30 seconds…
On some level, I have always believed that setting up routers and networking printers involves a large degree of luck (or knowledge of magic). For me, they work when they want to,.. I have learned to not force the issue. The second I decide that I dont care whether or not it works, it just happens. Of course, i have only tested this technique with linksys products.
I have only use Apple tech support once, my battery died in my macbook pro earlier this week and they had a new one on my doorstep within 12 hours. Unbelievable.
Mr. Zeldman, I feel your pain, and in a strange way, I feel consoled that as a PC owner, I’m not the only one out there with all these wireless router problems. My Linksys wireless router is barely a year old, and I’ve had frequent intermittent disconnects when connecting to it from my laptop. This includes the wonderful “cannot find router” Which is odd given that the router is sitting barely 10 feet from my laptop ( I got wireless to get rid of the ugly wires that kept tripping my long suffering wife, God bless her).
After many months of having to reset my router almost daily, and turn on and turn off the router, DSL modem and PC/laptop, it magically started working smoothly. Evil magic, ’tis, this wireless beast.
The Apple router may not be broken. The problem may be that the phone company that delivers the the DSL isn’t letting any router have an IP address.
To test if the problem lay with Apple’s Airport Extreme router, I bought a new, top-of-the-line Linksys WRT300N and wasted a morning trying to configure it. The Linksys router is accessed via a web-based utility, invoked by entering a default IP address in a browser’s address field and pressing Enter. The process always timed out without connecting. (The cables were connected; all the modem’s lights were lit; all the appropriate router lights were lit; but the router could not connect to the modem to enable configuration, even after multiple power cycles, and no matter what browser was used.)
Odds are against both the Apple and Linksys routers being defective right out of the box. Although not conclusive, the test suggests that the problem is with the phone connection, not with Apple or Linksys hardware.
I next tested Kingpixel’s assertion that Verizon’s maintenance of a multi-hour DHCP lease on connected devices would prevent any router from working unless it was left connected for several hours.
I tested by leaving everything connected for the rest of the morning and afternoon. At 3:30 p.m. I still could not connect to the Linksys’s IP address, even after multiple power cycles etc.
After unplugging the router and plugging back into the modem, it then took 60 minutes before I had a connection again. This inability to reconnect via the modem has occured every time I’ve inserted a router and removed it; it suggest that Kingpixel is right—that Verizon does indeed maintain some sort of timed lease over any connected device.
But even after that timed lease expires, I cannot get an IP address to “take” on any router I’ve tried.
This little problem began when I asked my ISP to upgrade the speed of my existing DSL connection. Three weeks in, I finally have a working connection. A wireless network that distributes that connection may be too much to hope for. Gosh, why would the phone company make it tough to buy DSL service from a third-party ISP?
I would have suggested getting a nice shiny new laptop with Vista installed, but then I’d have to shoot myself.
For the record, I did get Vista. Now I am patiently waiting for service pack 1 to fix all the obvious bugs while introducing a plethora of new ones.
Some ISPs will lock service to to a specific MAC address. You may want to go into your router, and tell it to spoof the MAC Address of the computer you’re plugging directly into the modem. I’m pretty sure I had to tell my Netgear router to spoof my home PCs MAC address before comcast would let it get an IP address.
I wouldn’t think ISP issues would prevent you from accessing your Linksys router’s web based interface either – really, accessing the management pages from the LAN side of the router has nothing to do with the WAN side of things.
I second what Brennan Todd just said. Different technology, same situation: My Comcast connection would only allow an “approved” machine IP access through the modem (in other words the modem was initialized with my laptop’s MAC address as the approved computer). I found this out from the technician. As soon as I heard that, I said, “thank you” and ended my call. I cloned my laptop’s address to my router and everything worked fine.
This doesn’t mean it’s the same for you, but it sounds suspiciously familiar.
With all due respect, you could have just plugged the DSL ethernet line from the modem to your computer to eliminate the wireless router.
This reminds me somewhat of an incident that happened to me. I run a website at tutorialstuff.com. And my only real day of the week to work on it is on Saturdays. Well two weeks ago my local cable company decides to do some network upgrades with out telling any of its customers of the “planned” outages. It lasted about 10 hours and I could not get through to a technician until the servers were back up and running. I was finally told that if I had gone to their website I could have gone to their news section and saw that these were “planned”.
I had a similar issue with my mother’s linksys router and Verizon’s DSL software and modem. A call to Verizon’s Mac support line yielded the best (non-outsourced, technically proficient) result. It turns out it wasn’t MAC addresses or any of her Macs’ IP addresses.
The way it was explained to me (I am a plug-and-play cable subscriber, so don’t jump on me if this is oversimplified or incorrect) most DSL modems evidently want/need to be in control of DHCP themselves, when that’s the router’s job. So the Verizon tech had me log into the modem and tweak a bunch of settings that allowed the linksys router to be in charge of DHCP instead. Everything works great now…
But I can’t go into my router, sir. During one of my many sad little experiments, I typed the required MAC IP address (instead of the router’s IP address) into the browser address field in yet another attempt to evoke the router configuration dialog. The browser reported that the IP address seemed to be valid, but the router couldn’t connect — perhaps the “server” was busy.
With all due respect, I’m doing that. I did that as soon as I had a working DSL connection. (That took three weeks.) The problem isn’t connecting a new DSL line to a single computer. That three-week fiasco is behind me. The problem now is connecting the other computers here to the same DSL line via wireless.
But thanks for caring. And I don’t mean to be abrupt, I’m just done. They can set fire to the internet for all I care.
Living in a Canadian/U.S. border city, I can say that I have switched ISPs, from one country to another, at least a half dozen times in the time I’ve lived here.
There a all sorts of boundaries to an ISP’s success, I suppose, but there’s no reason to have a lack of communication at the foundational level, like you seem to be experiencing.
I feel your mac support pain. Phone calls to mac always seem to be very long. Unsurprisingly our problems all related to a non-Apple router and wireless connectivity.
I may misunderstand, or you might be confusing a MAC address with an IP address. A MAC address is a hardware address that never changes. (unless cloned, as others have mentioned here) It’ll look something like:
00:0a:95:ba:1c:c7.
You can see your computer’s MAC address by going to System Preferences–>Network. Show: Ethernet or Airport, depending on which you MAC address you need.
Based on a MAC address, an ISP might hand the device (computer, router, etc.) an IP address using DHCP. A lease might well be based on a MAC address.
An IP address now, like one handed out by DHCP:
129.10.5.5
When DHCP is involved, your IP address may change. If a router is in the equation, it gets an IP address from the ISP, then does its own DHCP thing to hand out IP addresses to your local network.
It should be possible to gain access to either router without ever going near the DSL. Just connect the router directly to your Mac via an ethernet cable and, almost immediately, you _should_ be able to connect to the routers web based interface directly (using it’s default IP address). From there you can tweak some settings (like setting a ‘spoof’ Mac address if required, possibly enabling ‘remote admin’ [which will let you log in over wireless, etc].
If you get that far then you _should_ be able to plug the DSL into the router and _watch_ it’s reaction from the web-based interface. Won’t solve all your problems but should make diagnosing them easier.
Sorry if you’ve tried all this already.
I love it! Great writing Jeffrey. Makes me glad I took my wireless router back to the shop because I thought it would be a bit of a nightmare to set up and I didn’t really need it.
now try hooking up your brand new Airport Extreme with your XBox360 – another good 6 hours spent troubleshooting and finding old hardware to patch it up and trying to mend things that should just work without problems. I have sent a total of six apple laptops and two iSights back. My mum sent 2 back. Wonder when I will finally lose my patience. (maybe the iPhone, first generation, will provide the answer..)
How many web professionals does it take to plug in a router?
Jeff, your old friend in London… heard you were having a spot of bother over there. Wish I could fly over and help… Good luck!
I’d answer that last question Jeffrey, but it took so long for me to get a connection I’d forgot the pithy response I’d worked out ;).
I’ve got a MacBook Pro which has been totally unreliable, prone to crashing and requires a wipe of the PDRAM every time I move to a new location (which given it’s a laptop, is fairly often). I’ve sent it back for repairs 3 times in six months to have the logic board replaced, RAM replaced, and finally, the techs threw up their hands and said it was the third party RAM I’d put in it (I HAVEN’t put anything in it – that was the Apple reseller I bought the machine from).
When I called Apple, their tech support couldn’t help me, they’re customer relations people picked up the phone for long enough to hang up, and then when I called back, their operator told me it was my fault I’d been disconnected.
Their products are shit. Their customer service smells just as bad. Depressingly, I still can’t quite bring myself to go back to windows.
For some reason when I moved to my current apartment, the wireless wouldn’t connect in the way you mentioned. I ran the setup assistant and it got me a connection, but it’s very exclusive. My wireless no longer works ANYWHERE else.
Jeff,
Send me an email and I can help you fix this problem. I work for the phone company (AT&T not Verizon), but the systems they both use are similar, they used to be the same company as we all know.
I agree with Josh. First you need to setup the router without hooking it up to your modem. Once you know the router is configured properly, then connect your modem. If this fails then you have a problem with the modem.
@Ben Ryan,
You can always try ubuntu. It’s pretty painless these days to set up and when you have problems like this it will let you get some pretty detailed debugging information from the logs. Something difficult to get on Win or Mac OS’s.
And when the DSL/Cable/ISP tech hears what OS your running they automatically forward you to someone who knows what your doing. Their script is useless on my OS :-)
I had an identical problem with Verizon when we switched routers (from Linksys to having the XServer route everything. After a while on the phone with Verizon, it was explained that Verizon’s systems maintain a IP lease to the previous router or computer and it stays there until it gets released and not renewed. If you attempt to simply reboot, that won’t work, and trying to release via the previous router won’t work either, because it releases and renews too fast before you disconnect it. In our case, the only thing we could do was attach a Windows machine directly to the modem, and then via the Command Line, release the DHCP, which had the unique effect of releasing the IP and then allowing a new device to get the IP. There are so many variables between different setups, but this sounds like it could apply.
Good luck.
Thanks, Travis, Josh, and everybody. Just a few quick notes:
A lousy phone company policy is not the source of the problem. The source of the problem remains unknown. I’ll post an update when the problem is resolved, if I learn anything of value.
Jeff,
As a lot of people have said your initial problem appears to be your internal network setup, this is what allows your mac to connect to the Linksys via it’s default IP which should be 198.162.0.1 or similar. If you have tried what Josh suggested and plugged into the router directly and still had no joy then you need to reconfigure you IP config on your mac, check to make sure you are configured to just get an IP address via DHCP and do not have a hard coded IP in there. Once you have this all working and you can get to the Linksys web interface then you can configure the Wireless Access point SSID and security and also the net connection/WAN/External network config and then plug in the modem and try from there.
Let me know via email if you need any further info or help or MSN instant chat.
Uh, maybe it’s time to hire an IT staff?
Actually, I assumed all these years that you and a lot of the other early famous web people were on T1 or similar lines early on, and thus the ability to surf/congeal so much info so quickly. Guess I was wrong.
Suggestion only.
Dear Mr. Zeldman,
I feel your pain. Up until a series of frustrating problems with a new MacBook Pro, I wrongly assumed that when I needed customer care there would be a competent and professional customer support team ready to help. My than six month old MacBook Pro ended up being out of service for a total of 32 days and was practically rebuilt three times before finally returning to me in working order. After this experience the next time I have to make a major purchase I think I will take a look at what other manufacturers have to offer. Apple customer support just does NOT deliver the professional and quality support that they tout. I wish you best of luck and hope that some clever reader out there can help transform your paperweight into the functional piece of equipment that “just works” like it’s supposed to.
Try accessing just the wireless router without it being hooked to the WAN side. So, LAN on router to Enet port on Mac. See if you can get in that way. If not, the problem is not your network. Try a different cable if this is a problem. Also, try a different browser. And make a new location in Network that only uses the Ethernet port. A little narrowing down will go a long way with tier 2 (see below how to get there faster).
Also, every time you connect a different device to the modem, disconnect the power to the modem for about a minute. This will reset its MAC address memory. Otherwise, as you found, it will have to time out.
Ex-Applecare veteran here. The way to get to tier 2 quickly is to refuse to agree with the tier 1 agent in any way. They have a limited time to “gain agreement” with the customer, and if they can’t they have to get T2 on the line. Politely but firmly disagree with everything, refuse to co-operate by doing stupid stuff, and call back if you get a T1 agent too obtuse to get it. The skill levels on T1 vary wildly, from die-hards to people who are looking up your issue in a stack of Macs for Idiots books.
Also, steve@apple.com can work wonders.
Hi! I work as a trainer for a call center that supports DSL connections. I understand what you may be going thru. I will go with the suggestion that someone made earlier. Ask for a supervisor and insist for one. If you don’t thru to one, hangup and callback. You may need to call the helpdesk around 3 times at the most, not more than that. You will get a supervisor to help you out.
As far as your configuraition is concerned. The way we go about doing this is. First hold the reset switch on the modem for 3 secs. this clears your username and password from the modem. Also do it on the router, so you know that does not have your username and passoword stored in it.
Now, before you go wireless wih your router, it is important that you are able to get online using an ethernet connection. this will let you isolate your problem. i.e. –> Connect your modem to your router with ethernet & connect your router to your computer with ethernet. If you are able to setup your internet connection with ethernet. You will know this is purely a wireless configuration issue.
A few tips on working around with wireless is :
1.Make sure distance is not an issue.
2.Disable all security and check if it works(disable WEP on the router)
3.Make sure your IP is set to DHCP(optained from the router rather than forced into the computer)
More info on setting up linksys with Verizon:
http://www.dslreports.com/faq/1372
If you need support with this, mail me your number. I’d be glad to help you with this.
I got the problem resolved a while back. Thanks, everyone.
Any Airport Extreme Experts out there?
I bought a base station tonight. Have a house filled with Macs.
Have Bellsouth DSL.
Connected DSL to Airport Extreme Basestation.
Configured all computers in the house.
Using the Airport Utility, configured the network.
Everything in the house is working fine.
Except…
The AMBER light, which indicates no network connection, still blinks on the Airport box. I’ve restarted the modem, Airport, etc. Still blinks. But everything in the house is working fine.
If I open the Airport Utility, it says ‘You have a base station that needs attention.” So I reconfigure it again, the software says “Congrats, you are up and running!” and all the Macs throughout the house work fine.
And the AMBER LIGHT is still blinking.
Ideas?
Thanks
Tom
Just for posterity’s sake, gotta agree with Danny. If you’re hooked into the router properly and your computer’s networking settings are configured properly, you should have NO problem reaching the internal control panel screen for the router. Connecting to the router’s internal control panel by HTTP to 198.162.etc. has absolutely nothing to do with whether your broadband access is working. That connectivity is on an independent network, created by the router, to which it will eventually deliver the broadband access.
Aside from the various “check this” and “check that” suggestions, I’d also suggest checking your firewall settings. If you’re behind NAT provided by the router, it’s safe to try turning off your machine’s software-based firewall briefly to see if that solves things. If it does, then you know that you need to configure your firewall properly.
In about 60% of the connectivity issues I’ve encountered, a misconfigured firewall was the point of failure.