Hello everyone, I know this looks like a very long post for a Monday morning. Sorry. But it makes quite a nice little story. Recently I signed up with Virgin broadband and last week my phone line was activated. I immediately started installing my Netgear DG814 modem router (which I bought having read reviews saying how easy it is to install and use - I'm a computer fool). The modem connects to my sitecom PCI network card. I was a little concerned because the netgear software didn't allow me to have virgin broadband as one of my dial-up connections in the "connections" tab of my internet options (which Virgin said I should have). Instead, the Netgear software took all of my sign-in details and created it's own dial up connection. When I tried to connect to the internet, I could only connect to a couple of web sites - yahoo.com and google.com. However I couldn't run a search in Yahoo (the browser would come up saying web page unavailable), although I could in Google. I tried other websites - google.co.uk, yahoo.co.uk, ebay.co.uk (see a pattern?), but they wouldn't work. I also tried microsoft.com, but that wouldn't work either. I phoned Netgear's support line (for about 3 hours), who suggested that my Internet connection sharing programs and my AOL dial on demand conenction were interfering with the modem, so I deleted them. This didn't work. Eventully Netgear told me to take it back to the shop I bought it from for a replacement. Of course, I bought the modem from Amazon, so I had to SEND it back, and now I'm waiting for a replacement to be sent back to me, all the while still paying for my broadband access that I can't use. Also, having deleted my AOL dial on demand connection, AOL is playing up as well (see post below). ANYWAY, my question is this - do the problems I had sound like I had a faulty modem/router, or is it my computer that has the problem, and furthermore, am I going to have the same problems when I eventually get my new modem? All I want is to have a fast connection and play games over the internet! :(

I have never heard of a modem/router combo. That's definately a new one for me. I have always seen them as DSL line into the external modem. Network cable from modem to router. Network cables from router to indivual pc's. My modem is a dual USB/ethernet modem. But I have seen many others and they are all the same way. So it could be the modem, and then again who knows?