I have seen this, too. It seems that AOL does take control of your dialup networking. I ran into real problems with this when I got my new laptop. I have found that rather than reinstall the OS, you can uninstall and reinstall AOL. In other words, it seems that AOL prevents further dialups once it is installed but didn't seem to take over any existing dialup settings. I can't believe I just admitted to using AOL
Truthfully, I am only on because my wife feels that we have to be. I guess if I want that new mobo and CPU then I better listen to her.