PPPoE Router Setup Ideas and Questions

[Metaphorically]

Hi all,
I'm new to these forums, but from surfing through old posts, I gather a lot of you fix computers for other people. I'm getting started in this (though I've done it for free for a long time), and I've got hung up on setting up a router for a client with a DSL connection. They connect to Sympatico via PPPoE with a Windows XP desktop with no problem. Now they've inserted a Linksys wireless router between the PC and the DSL modem and the PC still connects to the internet. It seems that the built-in Windows XP PPPoE client has no problem going through the router to talk to the modem, which I guess makes sense since it's all ethernet up to there. In this setup, however, the PC is making the connection, not the router. With one PC, that's no problem, but when they try to connect their Windows 98SE laptop to the router (over the wireless link) and get on the internet, the laptop of course can't see the internet. By the way, I know the wireless part is not an issue, since I can ping the router and the desktop from the laptop and that works fine.

I connected to the web based configuration utility for the router and entered the user name and had them enter the password for their dsl connection. I then tell the router to connect and it says "authentication failed." I disconnected the PPPoE client on XP and tried giving the service name, host name and domain name (sympatico.ca) that XP had, all of these made no difference. This was all done from the desktop. I also tried setting up XP internet sharing in a pitiful attempt to use the desktop as a gateway for the laptop. The laptop wouldn't accept the desktop as a gateway - it reverts to the router ip as it's gateway (reported by running 'ipconfig' and 'route print').

From reading the other threads in here (sharp people, you all seem ), the next steps I'll try will be:
- Uninstall the PPPoE client in XP somehow (I was hesitant to do this since it works now). I read elsewhere that this causes a conflict with using the router's PPPoE client.
- Reomove the PPPoE client from the Windows 98 laptop ("Access Manager"). It doesn't work anyways and I can't tell why (I'd guess that either it can't see through the router to the modem, or the desktop is already connected to the DSL modem).
- Access the router configuration from the laptop with the desktop turned off so I know there's nothing happening from XP.
- Reboot the DSL modem then the router a few times, just for good measure.

Does this sound like a reasonable approach? Is there any way to see the conversation over the PPPoE link that results in the "authentication failed" message? I think it's the XP client causing the problem, but I want to make sure I pack the full bag of tricks.

PS: Just so I don't sound like a total hack, when I first arrived, Linksys tech support apparently had them so turned around that the wireless nic and router couldn't even see each other (which they had done out of the box). Apparently they got set to different channels at some point, which a quick hardware reset on the router cured.

[glc]

If you are getting an authentication failed with the router, the username and password is not entered correctly or there is something wrong with the router firmware.

[Metaphorically]

Y'know, I saw the user double-check the password from a document supplied by Sympatico (the ISP) but I read in another post about some one doing the same thing and finding out that the user had the password changed after the initial connection was set up. I don't mean to be down on users, but I wonder if this is the same situation. I should have them call the ISP and check the username and password before I go try again.
Thanks, glc.

[glc]

Passwords are case sensitive too.

[Metaphorically]

Just in case you don't hear this often enough, you were right, glc. Now if only I'd gotten back to the client before they'd called their ISP and gotten the same answer.

[KMARTshopper]

with pppoe its easy.... if you have a router function enabled modem,,,,,, you need to set it in bride mode.... the router set it to bridege aswell,,, then you can set the XP software to pppoe..

or you can set the router to pppoe and it will call your isp....

KMARt

[glc]

kmart - the issue was solved, please read the whole thread before replying.