My DSL connection at home has been on the fritz these last few days (and even dial-up won’t work there anymore – the modem claims it can’t detect the dial tone), so until it gets fixed I can only connect when I’m in the office (where competing demands tend to claim my attention).
(Yes, I’ve checked to make sure everything is plugged in.)
So expect diminished web presence from me for the next few days as I await the arrival of my tech dervish.
Roderick,
Regular modems use an analog phone line. DSL stands for “DIGITAL Subscriber Line.” So, your modem isn’t going to get a dial tone, because your phone line is now speaking an entirely different language.
This very phenomenon has resulted in angst in my household since we switched to cable Internet (and digital VOIP phone service). My 8-year-old is a retro kind of guy and has several older devices with built-in modems that he now either can’t use online at all or would have to find some kind of adaptor for. His Sega Dreamcast, for example, has a built-in 56k modem, which was state-of-the-art for its time; if there’s a digital Internet device for it, I haven’t heard about it.