Things they have in common:
a) /home - check if it works using a different user, in case it's some setting stored in your home directory (seems unlikely though)
b) the hardware - have you got another machine you could test the modem with?
c) the ISP. Again, seems unlikely, but you never know
Failing any of those, I can't think why both installs would stop working at the same time (you're sure it's only /home that's shared between the two, right?). Unless it's just a really weird coincidence - whenever you have a weird problem, don't discount the possibility that it might be more than one problem. It's happened to me before.
Check out /var/log/ppp (or is it ppp.log? I forget, one or the other) as well as /var/log/messages ... post any specific error messages. The netmask thing sounds interesting, it should pick it up automatically along with your IP address when you connect.
Also, try it with both distro's, and check that the error messages match.
Cheers, Gareth
Jason Greenwood wrote:
Hope someone can help me out here.
Over the weekend I installed Mandrake 9.1 on a spare partition. I did this so that if Cooker broke something major, I had a spare stable system to boot into. All went well and I setup /home to be shared between cooker and stable. All went fine and I could boot either install having access to all /home stuff. I also upgraded my Cooker install to get the latest kernel and a few other bits and pieces. The problem is that now (after configuring my external modem) that I cannot connect to the net with EITHER install. It tries to connect but immediately after it says "logging onto network" (I use KPPP), the conn dies and it redials. I have NEVER had a problem with this modem and it is autodetected by linuxconf just fine. I checked in /var/log/messages and it says something about an invalid netmask??? I didn't set up a netmask and I am at a loss to find any reason for the problem.
Ideas??
Cheers
Jason
