And Then, No Connection….

No, not the WLAN problems of the past;** this was Skype. ‘Skype can’t connect’. {Only on the Windows 7 desk-top by the way.} Further down, in blue, ‘Help with this problem’. Worth a click I think. First up is the old favourite, ‘Shutdown the program and try again in two minutes.’ That didn’t work so what’s the alternative? ‘Contact your IT Administrator.’ Right, I can do that.
”G’day. How are I today?”
”I’m fine thanks. And me?”
”I’m good too. So, how can I help me?”
”Skype won’t connect.”
”have I tried shut…..”
”Yup. Didn’t work.”
”Sorry, I can’t help me then.”
”Is that the best I can offer me?”
”Yup, that it is.”
”Damn! Thank me anyway.”
”I’m welcome. And I hope I have a nice day.”
”And I. Bu-by.”

I use Skype version 4 as I also have VOIP DECT phones and learned a long time ago that they are no longer supported, driver wise, by the manufacturer and version 4 was the last compatible Skype release wot worked.

What to do. Do what we all do in such situations. Trawl Google, select the most complex, restore pointing, firewall shutdowning, registry modifying, deleting, re-installing, time consuming cure to the connection problem and have at it.

As pretty much expected, no joy.

Hay!! How about a new account? Went through the hoops only to be informed, and I kind o’ knew this was coming, Skype can’t connect at this time.

After a couple or three hours I thought, well that’s it. It’s dead in the water on this machine so I may as well load the latest desktop version and put the phone drivers on a laptop for VOIP DECT phoning, via Skype, for her indoors to call family and friends in far, far, far away places.

This I did and guess what? The latest version of Skype connected straight away. Guess what again? The VOIP phones worked straight away. I’m guessing you’ve guessed what the last ‘guess what’ is. I started ‘trouble shooting’ at the two hour hard end and worked slowly back to the two minute easy end. Why do we – okay – I always seem to do that?

** I may not have mentioned wot MAY have been the WLAN problem of old. Just before the laptop went for a few away-days, her indoors said, above my cursing the laptop, “Wot is small led light on scleen then?” That’s ‘red’ and ‘screen’ by the way.

Under the coffee table, lying there unused, was a wireless mouse. So? So it was still switched on and the ‘on’ light was reflecting in the screen. Switching him off was the moment the WLAN service started starting at start-up. So was that the cause? Was the mouse hunting for it’s dongle and causing WLAN conflicts? I have no idea but since switch-off no further problems were, or have been, encountered. No, I haven’t tried replicating the issue.

In other surprise news today an RBS person, commenting on the fine imposed on the bank for their lamentable mortgage advice, states that lessons have been learned. Meanwhile, in Rotherham, ‘Shaun of the Left’ states he won’t be resigning as he believes he’s doing a bang-up job and anyway lessons have been learned. So there you go; ‘lessons learned’ wins the day yet again. But let’s not forget the ever popular  runners-up, ‘drawing lines’ and  ‘going forward’. Six meaningful words formed into three meaningless phrases.

Quote;  Scott Douglas.

“I am convinced that grandkids are inherently evil people who tell their grandparents to "just go to the library and open up an e-mail account - it's free and so simple.”