Can set up DSL with PC but not Mac

Question

Level 1

60 points

Can set up DSL with PC but not Mac

Hi,

Moving into a new apartment, I have a DSL account all ready to go. I never set one up before so am not familiar at all with how to do it. I tried first on the Mac and failed to get a connection. With the PC, I followed the Network Wizard and am able to connect online.

I retried the Mac and still can not get any success. Here is what I do. I went to system preferences/network. There clicked assist me and followed all instructions. When I had entered in my name and password, an unable to establish network connection error appeared. Clicking on diagnose button, I followed all the directions and selected PPPoE. After clicking continue, a connection message appears but then hangs. I then am told that network diagnostics cannot fix the current problem.

I then go back to my windows computer and plug right in and am immediately connected.

Can anyone understand why I cannot get my Mac up and running but my PC works just fine? I am too new at this to see what is wrong.

Thank you!

Macbook Pro, 2.53 ghz, 15" antiglare screen, Mac OS X (10.6.2), 4 gigs RAM

Posted on Feb 9, 2010 12:12 AM

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Answer 1

baltwo

Level 9

62,386 points

Feb 9, 2010 12:26 AM in response to Ratty Mouse

Talk to the DSL people and ensure you've installed the appropriate software and can register more than one machine. It's been too long ago that I dropped DSL, but vaguely remember needing to install the software, dialing into the router/ISP to get things to work properly. Your ISP should have all the gory details.

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Answer 2

Ratty Mouse Author

Level 1

60 points

Feb 9, 2010 12:46 AM in response to baltwo

Ack! I was hoping that this was advice I would not get! You see, I am in China (and do not speak Chinese), so talking to someone here will be much harder than back when I was in the states.

Still, I may have to go that route to truly end this problem. I just do not understand why a PC can be hooked up in seconds and a Mac cannot? I turned off the DSL modem to try to start from square one with the Mac.

Another question: I have never had a wireless set up in my house before. Would going wireless fix this problem? Surely my Mac could connect to any wireless set up that was set up by this DSL modem.

Any thoughts on this and recommendations on how to get started?

Thanks again.

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Answer 3

Dogcow-Moof

Level 8

36,851 points

Feb 9, 2010 1:48 AM in response to Ratty Mouse

Are you sure the DSL router/modem is compatible with Macs?

Some require the use of a driver that only runs under Windows.

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Answer 4

Ratty Mouse Author

Level 1

60 points

Feb 9, 2010 2:15 AM in response to Dogcow-Moof

No I am not sure. I was not aware that some modems are not Mac compatible so did not consider that as part of the problem. The modem I have looks to be some generic Chinese one so may likely not be compatible. Maybe I have to change this.

Thanks.

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Answer 5

Dogcow-Moof

Level 8

36,851 points

Feb 9, 2010 4:41 AM in response to Ratty Mouse

You may also want to double check that the ISP doesn't require the MAC address of the interface connecting with the DSL modem to be registered with the ISP.

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Answer 6

Ratty Mouse Author

Level 1

60 points

Feb 9, 2010 8:35 AM in response to Dogcow-Moof

"You may also want to double check that the ISP doesn't require the MAC address of the interface connecting with the DSL modem to be registered with the ISP. "

What does this mean? I have never heard of this before. What MAC address?

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Answer 7

AJ

Level 5

7,075 points

Feb 9, 2010 10:04 AM in response to Ratty Mouse

If your router supports PPoE (many do), then do not use the PPoE option on the Mac network connection page.

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Answer 8

a brody

Level 10

85,366 points

Feb 9, 2010 10:20 AM in response to Ratty Mouse

Often what high speed modems do is gear themselves to one machine only unless they are disconnected for at least 45 seconds from that machine while the modem is turned off (or unplugged from power). Then you can connect to the second machine and turn back on the modem (plug it back in), and it will work with that machine. If that works, then the issue can only be resolved by getting some sort of router with ethernet if both machines support it, or WiFi if both machines support it. Apple's Airport Extreme supports both methods of connection. There are cheaper ones, but you have to make sure that if you are going to use WiFi, they have been certified for the final 802.11n standard.

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Answer 9

Dogcow-Moof

Level 8

36,851 points

Feb 9, 2010 5:43 PM in response to Ratty Mouse

The Ethernet interface in machines has a hardware address associated with it.

Some ISPs require you to register that address with them so that that computer and only that computer can connect to the network.

Sometimes ISPs that do this use a timeout (as a brody mentioned), other times they require you to register the machine with them.

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Answer 10

Ratty Mouse Author

Level 1

60 points

Feb 10, 2010 12:57 AM in response to Dogcow-Moof

Amazing! I managed to fix this problem somehow while poking around the network system preference. Using the diagnostic assistant never got the Mac connected. What I think I did was create a PPPoE service. Here too I was asked to input the account name and password. This time it worked. What is different about this method and the other is not clear to me. But the results are very good as my Mac is now connected. I wish I could give more details to help others but I truly do not know what I did that fixed this.

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