I have been working at home now for over 2 year, for all that time I have had PlusNet as my ISP and been using my trusty Neatgear DG834G modem. For most of those 2 years I have been connecting to my employer using Microsoft's Small Business Server (SBS) VPN connection. Other than the odd occasion when either theirs or my connection has been down, this has worked flawlessly.
Just before Christmas I decided to upgrade my Netgear modem to a D-Link DSL-2740B, at which point my troubles began. This new modem (even with the latest firmware) would drop my VPN connection frequently. Other services such as Live Messenger and my PS3 would also drop connections. Normally just hitting the re-connect button everything would be fine. But it got to a point after so many re-connects the SBS VPN software simply could not make a connection at all (though I still can ping the IP address).
I have now switched back to my Netgear modem and have returned to my normal stable connection, and the D-Link returned to the store that sold it.
The problem is, I now find if I have to disconnect my VPN connection (maybe to reboot the PC) I simply cannot reconnect during the afternoon. Though strangely I can disconnect/reconnect fine in the morning. I have not done lots of testing to find exactly at what time the problem occurs, as I tend to want to keep my connection alive for as long as possible.
Other employees have no problem connecting at the times when I cannot connect. So it would appear to me that something is blocking my VPN connection, and is time dependent. I have no 3rd party firewall software, just XP Prof SP2 with the standard MS firewall. The modem settings have not changed.
Any ideas/suggestions?
Thanks in advance,
Stephen
