Cable/DSL Modem & Dial-up Co-existence
will they co-exist? YES !!
The cardinal Rule
Installation - Install Cable/DSL first - then DialUp. If you already have DialUp and gets a new Cable/DSL service, then delete the DialUp, installl the Cable/DSL, then re-install DialUp !!
What IP connection your PC Defaults to - In normal mode you are not dialed up to your dial-up ISP and are using Cable/DSL only - so all IP traffic uses that connection. When you dial up your ISP, you now have two IP connections - by default, Windows uses the dial-up connection as the default gateway, overriding the cable/DSL modem. All Internet traffic uses the dial-up connection. When it's disconnected, all traffic again uses the cable modem.
When not dialed up -
Web Traffic - web surfing traffic goes through your Cable/DSL modem.
Email - you can receive email from both Cable/DSL email account, and your Dial-up email account. You can only send email via your Cable/DSL account.
NewsGroups - you can only use your Cable/DSL news servers (nntp servers) for both receiving and uploading posts.
When dialed up -
Web Traffic - web surfing traffic goes through your DialUp connection..
Email - you can receive email from both Cable/DSL email account, and your Dial-up email account. You can only send email via your Dial-up account.
NewsGroups - you can only use your Dial-Up news servers (nntp servers)for both receiving and uploading posts.
Once you have setup your High-Speed service, you may still have a need for your dial-up. The most common reason for this is to keep your old email going. Another reason is to have a backup, in case your Cable/DSL service goes down (and it will go down !!). This is a judgment call. Some peopl want to combine their Cable/DSL service with dial-up to increase upload speed (which is usually not very fast in ANY service) - this is asking for trouble, but if you must - see this article - http://homepage.ntlworld.com/robin.d.h.walker/cmtips/dialup.html .
But once you have spent the typical 2-3 days configuring and troubleshooting the new Cable Modem or DSL service -you may find that your Dial-Up service no longer works !! You can spend a long time trying to troubleshoot this, but instead, remember the steps for installing high-speed Internet access and keeping your dial-up access. You must add the dialup AFTER the Cable.DSL :
They should Co-exist
If you have both, 99% of the time you will be using cable/dsl alone. When you dial-out to your ISP, then you have two Internet connections going.
When this occurs, by default, XP uses a dial-up connection as the default gateway, overriding the cable modem. All Internet traffic uses the dial-up connection. When it's disconnected, all traffic again uses the cable modem.
If for some reason you wish to prevent overriding the cable modem default gateway, un-check "Use default gateway on remote network" in the dial-up connection's Properties | Networking | Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) | Properties | Advanced. Then, only traffic addressed to the dial-up connection's IP subnet will use the dial-up connection. All other traffic will use the cable modem default gateway.
Adding Explicit Routes
Most Cable/DSL ISP's have terrible News servers. So you may want to access your old dial-up ISP news servers, and have everything else go though your Cable/DSL.
You should be able to route the old dial-up ISP's nntp (newsgroups) traffic through the dial-up connection by creating an explicit static route:, using the DOS command, route.exe - for example:
route add a.b.c.d mask 255.255.255.255 e.f.g.h
- where "a.b.c.d" is the nntp server's IP address, and "e.f.g.h"
is the dial-up connection's IP address. You will need to ping the nntp
server to find it's IP address. This command will force all traffic from
the nntp server to your dial-up connection (the dial-up IP address will be
different every time you dial in, so you have to re-issue this command each
time)
If that doesn't help you solve the problem, you can view the TCP/IP route table by entering "route print" in DOS. Or enter "route print > temp.txt" to save the routes to a text file.
What Connection will the PC default To ??
Cable/DSL is always on - 24x7. So when you dial out, and connect, you now have 2 paths to the Internet. You PC will not use both - it has to choose. By default, XP uses a dial-up connection as the default gateway, overriding the cable modem. All Internet traffic uses the dial-up connection. When it's disconnected, all traffic again uses the cable modem.
Email Issues
Most ISP's will let your RETRIEVE email via POP3 from outside their network but not SEND mail (SMTP). Reason being POP3 usually is set up to require authentication via a userid and password whereas SMTP usually is not.