wvdial

Forum: Networking
Topic: wvdial
started by: curious

Posted by curious on Nov. 12 2003,01:13

Ok, got DSL installed on hardrive of old 75mhz pentium. It connected and surfed and I was happy. Neat finding links now is a gui browser. Always liked links as a text browser. Unfortunately my isp started going goofy again three weeks after it flaked out before. I signed up with new isp. No problem connecting and surfing with DUN connection (no isp software) on old win95 laptop. However after I entered new data into wvdial configuration with DSL, it would dial the number, connect and then disconnect maybe 10 seconds later. There was a paragraph error message, but the wvdial box disappeared almost immediately so I couldnt read it. And yes I went over data several times. Ok, on a lark I booted Knoppix cd on 75mhz pentium (used a boot floppy) and using cheat code to for fluxbox window manager I got it to work. Slow, but got kppp to load and connect and once I got Konqueror loaded it surfs. I am using it now. Actually Konqueror doesnt do too bad even on such an old machine. I found out on another computer that Konqueror is less resource heavy than Mozilla so will surf better on low memory machine.

So does anybody have any ideas on why wvdial wont stay connected to my new isp when win95-DUN and KPPP can?

Posted by curious on Nov. 12 2003,11:55

Well thanks for all help :;):

but I kept playing with the settings and finally got wvdialer to connect and stay connected.

By way I downloaded Firebird. Its slow on this machine under DSL. I have to say when I got this old machine to boot Knoppix cd, it may have been super slow to load software, but once loaded Konqueror surfed faster on Knoppix than Firebird does on DSL. Somebody here mentioned Opera surfs well on DSL. May try that or just stick to using links.

As a comparison, if anybody is interested, I have a very early version of win95 (didnt come with any version of IE and only needs about 45mb disk space to install it) on old laptop comparible to this 75mhz machine. K-meleon (another mini browser for windows based on mozilla) on that win95 is way faster than Firebird on DSL. Heck I got free Netscape cd and have Netscrape 7.0 installed on laptop also. It loads slow, but is almost as fast as K-meleon to surf with. Links on DSL is comparible.

Oh, whatever happened to Galeon. When I was using Mandrake8.x on a pII computer, it was fastest linux browser. It was Gnome related so suppose it has bunch Gnome dependencies.

Posted by davide on Nov. 12 2003,12:28

hum, your report is very interesting and usefull.
did you try dillo on DSL? how did it work? I mean, that browser is very light and fast.
how much ram do you have on your P75Mhz pc? has it got a double boot? if, so, how does winblows behave compared to dsl? are you enabling swap partition when you surf the net?

and finally: what were the changes you had to make on config file to get your dial up working? (just to let everybody know in case someone else has got this problem)

Posted by cbagger01 on Nov. 12 2003,19:34

I have yet to use Opera on DSL (I haven't done a hard disk install yet), but I have used Opera on the following system:

60Mhz Pentium
40MB RAM
Peanut Linux OS, stripped down to save memory and CPU

My experience was as follows:
Dillo, graphical Links and Mozilla (original Mozilla, NOT the Mozilla Firebird) ran unacceptably slow on my system.

Opera, even though it is a full-featured browser that is slow to load up, runs suprisingly well once it is up and running.

I have not compared it head-to-head with Firebird yet, but it beats the pants off of Dillo, Links and Mozilla when used on an old computer system.

Posted by Gilbert Ashley on Nov. 12 2003,21:30

Please post a copy of your wvdial.conf file. I have not been able to get wvdial to work on dsl, using pppconfig and pon/poff instead. I use opera 5,6,7 with mixed success. 5 is light and fast but buggy, 7.22 is heavy and slower but includes an e-mail client and(finally) history. 6.12 seems to be nice compromise for older hardware. Galeon needs Mozilla installed as it uses its' gecko rendering engine. It may also require gnome-libs and libxml2. Dillo is great for viewing local pages btu lacks functionality still for serious browsing. There is another alternative called BrowseX. It is a single binary file so you just unzip and drop it anywhere in your path. It does a better job of rendering than Dillo, but isn't very configurable. Again, Please post your wvdial.conf, I can't seem to find the right syntax.

Posted by cbagger01 on Nov. 13 2003,00:27

I have a cable modem and home router install, so I don't use wvdial.

As for Opera, I used version 6.02 on my old computer and it works well for me.

Posted by curious on Nov. 13 2003,00:42

I'll post copy of my wvdialer config file within couple days. I am just doing a quick email check and check on some bulletin boards I post to, then am off line for the night. I've used wvdialer before, long ago. What I wonder is why doesnt DSL use one of the many gui front ends for wvdialer that were popular before KPPP?

Dillo is slightly faster than links on DSL for me. Ok to just look, but no javascript support means its not particularly useful if you want to post on most modern bulletin boards. Firebird on dsl reminded me of IE5.5 on win95 on old computer. Just drags. Oh will mention I managed to crash Dillo which then crashed DSL. Got weird message next time I booted and couldnt get gui. Nothing on these forums but found info in google search. Nothing I found worked so just reinstalled DSL Will post about this also.

Posted by curious on Nov. 16 2003,17:12

Ok, I promised to give directions on setting up wvdial. You can go into files and modify them using your choice of editor, but author was so kind to give a setup script. I will give step by step instructions even rawest newbie can follow using the script. Well hopefully. This is for version 0.4.10 Probably work on other versions.

1. boot dsl either from cd or hardrive.
2. right click anywhere on blank space of desktop.
3. left click apps
4. left click system
5. left click PPP/wvdial
6. left click modemconfig
7. enter the number of com port that your modem is on
8. press enter
9. press enter
10. repeat steps 2 thru 5
11. left click pppconfig
12. type in "y" without quotes
13. press enter
14. replace 010700192070 with your isp's local pop number, not using any dashes or spaces. (To do this read about using vi editor. You use arrow keys to manuever cursor. Delete key to delete text. Esc key after deleting. Insert key before typing new text. Esc key again. When thru editing everything on this page, then type :wq and press enter. This saves all your changes.)
15. replace the word, username, with the username your isp assigned you. This may be in form of joeblow@myisp.com or may just be joeblow. You get the idea. Same as you would use in KPPP dialer or in DUN on winblows.
16. replace the word, password, with the password your isp assigned you. Remember when thru editing to press ESC then type :wq to save changes.
17. Now you are back to page asking if you want to edit pap secrets. Type y and enter.
18. Scroll down in pap secrets to:

* debian "" *
root * "internet" *
root arcor "internet" *
arcor * "internet" *

Leave all punctuation in place!! Replace the word, arcor, with your isp username. Replace the word, internet, with your isp password. Remember this is still using vi editor commands as when editing previous page.
19. Scroll down to:

debian * password

Replace the word, password, with your isp password. Dont forget to press ESC and save changes by typing :wq and pressing enter.
20. You are now back to selection page. Type n and enter if you dont need to see the previous pages over again. Have to do this twice.
21. Back to desktop, repeat steps 2 thru 5, then click wvdial. A wvdialer box should appear and connect you to your isp. Once connected, minimize dialer box, dont close it. Closing it disconnects you.
22. Now going thru steps 2 thru 5 again then left clicking floppyconfig lets you store the settings on a floppy disk. Same command also lets you restore them on a new boot. Handy for booting from cd. Your settings mostly will remain if you have hardrive install. One bug will force you to tell it once again which port you have modem. No biggie, just rerun modemconfig. Then you can connect.

Hope this helps.

Posted by curious on Nov. 16 2003,17:49

Quote (davide @ Nov. 12 2003,07:28)

Yes I tried dillo, it is fastest on my setup of DSL, but cant post on most bulletinboards since most now require javascript, at least minimal javascript. I have around 40mb ram. Yes I have dual boot with win95 and lilo controlling it. I tried experiment, I loaded IE5.5 off an old isp cd (bloated monster that is slow on old equipment), then CrazyBrowser (small browser that uses IE rendering engine and some other files). I then used ieradicater software to banish IE and save space (only a 300mb partition). CrazyBrowser lives and runs (apparently enough IE files remain). CrazyBrowser is quick but simular speed to K-meleon (mozilla derivative) Definitely faster than Firebird runs on DSL and with simular goodies. Oh and yes I gave DSL around a 60mb swap partition to play with. My instructions on setting up wvdial are in post previous to this. By way I like Sylpheed mail client alot. Tried the windows version also. Its slower but still stable. Also found another client called InScribe (free version is i.scribe) that is pretty good. Also available for both linux and windows. By way there is one called Geminisoft Pimmy for windows. Very small and kinda neat and its free.

Posted by Gilbert Ashley on Nov. 18 2003,22:18

Curious, thanks for posting such clear instructions. Just one thing, in pap-secrets did you change this line
root arcor "internet" *
or was it this one?
arcor * "internet" *
I've had a devil of a time with this because I live in Germany and the user names and passwords have to be inclosed in quotes as they contain non-alphanumeric characters. I really don't mind using the debian pppconfig/pon/poff but since wvdial is 'on the menu' it would be nice to amke it work. Thanks. Otherwise your HOWTO couldn't be any more explicit!

Posted by curious on Nov. 20 2003,04:03

Quote (Gilbert Ashley @ Nov. 18 2003,17:18)

I changed the word, arcor, and the word, internet, to my username and password in all lines of secrets file. I guess with German situation, you might end up with double quotes for your password. Just substitute whatever you use for username and password in other dialer programs into secrets file for the words arcor and internet leaving existing punctuation intact.