Am Not Able To Get On Line

Question

I was given a Mac by the neighbor. I have never used one of these before and am totally lost, as it came without software or instructions. I called my service provider to help me hook up to the internet (dialup) and when I tried to get on I heard the dialing, and saw the message "connecting" scrolling across the top, but then it just says "disconnecting" and I am never able to get on the internet. Thank you.

Answer 1

There should be some help topics available from the main
menu bar when the computer is running; the Help in Finder
menu on the right side of the click-on header topics.
In order to have the computer preference for dialup to be
a priority, you'll have to go into the System Preferences
panel for Network and check the settings. You can choose
to put the dialup connection as first in priority, and check it
so the computer will try that first. You can uncheckbox the
other items, or drag them into a priority of less dominance.
Also, the dialup control panel should have or show the
correct information to use your internet provider's setup.
Some of this may appear automatically, but from my
ancient dialup experiences, with dialup modems & scripts,
you may have to ask for specific info such as a DNS or
other IP info from your dialup service provider. These
settings are similar to PCs, since the protocols are neither
PC nor Macintosh; the numbers and info works with both.
The preferred dialup numbers have to be entered into
the Network setup panel in System Preferences, and
since I no longer am running Panther, I don't recall if
the look & feel of the system is very different than Tiger.
System Preferences> Network> (Network Status) check
Network Port Configurations> Internal Modem> and
drag the Internal Modem to the top of list, check mark it;
and do not change the Location from Automatic in the
upper section. That should not be important right now.
Back in the Show: section, choose Internal Modem; this
should allow you to see the setup screen and information
places where your internet provider's dialup settings go.
When you change the settings, or enter new information,
you can click on the button to Apply.
If you may be using the computer (perhaps wireless, if
the computer has the wi-fi card installed, etc) the Location
settings could be used to set up more than one configuration
and then be more readily able to choose when traveling to
one or another location and select safe or known access
points in other areas (or internet cafés or libraries, etc.)
To just get into setting up a home configuration, you can
leave the Location set to Automatic.
{If you get a wireless base station, you could configure the
base station (if a white orb-shaped AirPort Extreme base
or other with built-in dialup modem) to provide a signal
in your residence; so you could be wireless at home.
My AEBS base stations provide this option; now I don't
use the dialup modem built into the Extreme base station.
Mine support ethernet, wireless, dialup and sharing wi-fi.}
When setting up a base station, information on 'how to
set up a small local network' can be helpful. Also, to
use google searches to ferret out information is handy.
Hopefully this helps some... When you can, get DSL or
a faster internet connection. Some DSL is OK. In a few
cases, cable internet is over-rated if not just overpriced.
Fiber-optic internet would be nice; but without the newer
hardware to appreciate the increase, it is wasted.
Good luck & happy computing!