Talk Talk Set up problems!

[TOPAZ BILLY]

My sister has recently swapped broadband providers to the above!  but she is having no end of problems, and is still unable to connect.  She has been told that the cd she recieved has stopped her laptop from recognising the usb ports?? the tech bod she spoke said the only way of fixing it is her for to buy a router 65 pound and for him to fit it a further 35 pound??  any tech bods out there able to talk us through fixing her FREE internet service!!!  for free???


Michelle

[Nicola]

No tech advice I'm afraid but my friend and I spent an hour in the carphone warehouse on Saturday trying to get them to sort out her connection... she applied for it on the 4th of May and is still waiting    Apparently due to the huge uptake for this free broadband offer they're struggling to get people set up so the timescales given now are up to 3 months! I would advise her to go into a carphone warehouse shop, they were much more helpful for her than the people in their callcentre have been!

[Wightpaws]

I've got no advice sorry, just wanted to sympathise as we have talk talk for over a year now and can't remember a time when we've logged on without problems, whether it is - failure to connect, incorrect user id/password, remote computer failed to answer in a timely manner  that's my personal favourite.  Sorry I have to laught about this now or I would scream.  We had a problem the other night and it took 35 minutes to get through to helpline and then surprise no answer.........  So guess what we're changing back to BT Broadband and stuff Talk Talk

[CraftySam]

My sister has recently swapped broadband providers to the above!  but she is having no end of problems, and is still unable to connect.  She has been told that the cd she recieved has stopped her laptop from recognising the usb ports?? the tech bod she spoke said the only way of fixing it is her for to buy a router 65 pound and for him to fit it a further 35 pound??  any tech bods out there able to talk us through fixing her FREE internet service!!!  for free???


Michelle

Now I'm no tech bod, but I'm confused by what she's been told.  First off the cd has stopped her laptop for recognising the usb ports....not sure about that but my new laptop stopped recognising the usb ports and my motherboard was faulty so could it be conincidental. There is a way of returning the laptop to how it was prior to installing cd. When you turn on the laptop keep pressing F5 that will bring up the option to log in as Administrator and then the laptop can be taken back to any date so she can select a date before the cd was installed. Only thing is after that I can't remember how to get to that .....so I'm pretty useless I'm afraid. 
But the main thing that rights alarm bells is that bit about £35 to install the router.  A router is a box that plugs into an electrical socket and phone socket.  It enables you to connect to the internet wirelessly through your lap top. £65 for a router is fair enough but why would that need installing at £35. 
The only thing I wonder about is if your sisters laptop has wireless capabilities? How new is it? Is that what they are talking about installing? But then your sister would have to buy the wireless card and the router and have the wireless card installed.
It seems a bit odd to me so I wouldn't go ahead until you can speak to a proper tech bod, preferably not from Talk Talk. 

[miche]

I have had TalkTalk for about 3 weeks now and I am totally fed up with it.  AOL was so much better.  When I phoned to cancel AOL they offered me a deal that was only £5 dearer than TalkTalk and I have to pay about £80 to get out of my TalkTalk contract and that is what I want to do but goodness knows what kind of problems I will encounter getting rid of TalkTalk. 

The thing that annoys me is you can never get through to any tech help and if you do they end up cutting you off, I am forever having connection problems.  Today for instance I wanted to log on to see what was on at the IMAX but by the time I logged on the bl@@dy film had finished!! - what's the point in that.

If I were your sis I would see if she could get out of the contract now!!

Sorry not to be much help

[TOPAZ BILLY]

Thanks everyone I did try to warn her about talk talk as I had heard so many horror stories about them .

Sam I think the 35 pound is to fix the pc so that it does recognise the usb?  and then install the router and talk talk without using the cd that talk talk sent out?? I have set up a wireless router myself and it was a doddle but I did have  a cd from blueyonder that took me through step by step really easy.

As for the talk talk helpline   if you do speak to an operator they don't let you explain the problem and then put you through to a department where nobody is available to take your call so they cut you off!!!

Michelle

[LoveCatz]

Not a tech bod but I have been waiting for my modem since 18/04. I've been told my line has been set up but I haven't had the disc or modem. My father in law has had nothing but porblems. We are moving in a few weeks and they can't tell me if I will be able to have talk talk there but will charge me £70 for forfeiting my contract if I can't!

[MollieMoo]

Sorry I can't offer any advice either

Luckily I had already invested in a Wireless router so I could use my laptop downstairs and my other PC is upstairs, so when I signed up to TalkTalk all I had to do is ask my brother for the settings as he was already on  Talk Talk (I bought the same router as him) and I was up and running straight away on the 29th June.  I still haven't received my modem or cd, and I even had a letter from them the other day asking for my Migration Code to swap me over from Wanadoo!!!!!!!

I also hung on the telephone for technical help for 30 mins to be finally cut off.  Absolutely disgusting.

My sister has also had problems with Talk Talk, but that is another story.......................

[kb]

Hi, I have heard there is problems because you get free anti-viral software with it- if you install it when you have other anti-viral software already running it shuts everything down on you. You need to uninstall their security software - maybe worth a look

[miche]

I didn't take up their offer of security because I have my own.  When I phoned tech help they told me to reset my router (I don't have one) and the problem was because I didn't install their security

[ReadingSteve]

Sounds like Talk Talk is cheap, but their support is not best quality! I'd be pleased to try and help anyone who is having problems, although I don't have any direct experience with Talk Talk myself - yet. However a friend has asked me to help her get set up tomorrow, so I'm going armed with all your stories of how bad it's been for you!

This business of disabling the USB sounds quite serious! I wonder whether the ASDL modem is plugged into the USB port, or the Ethernet (network) port on your PC? I think many modems can be set up in either configuration.

I think my approach would be to try and get by without using their set-up CD. This should be possible, assuming that they have supplied all of the configuration and usernames/ passwords etc. on paper. Not much help for anyone whose PC has already been corrupted by this software though! If their software has actually disabled the USB ports on your PC, then paying for a router is not going to fix this problem! Tell me more!

[ReadingSteve]

Well after a bit of a wrestling match, I did finally manage to get our friend connected to Talk Talk! It was quite a challenge though.

First of all, their CD installation wouldn't run on the older version of Internet Explorer that our friend had. They had supplied a more up-to-date version on the CD, but you had to search for it. Not at all intuitive.

Even when the Internet Explorer had been upgraded, there were some missing components - something to do with scriping and install on demand. Because the TalkTalk CD had already hi-jacked the internet settings, it was quite messy to get back to the old dial up acccount to get these bits sorted out. In the end, I did what I should have done in the first case, and did the install without the assistance of the CD. I located the modem drivers on the CD and installed these. This put a new icon on the desktop, and I was able to double click this, enter the username and password, and connected to Broadband no problems.

I am still worried about the problems connecting that you guys are talking about, but for now, at least, our friend is happy!