Call your isp support line. They should be happy to talk you through setting up the connection. I assume its a regular dial up account ... just plugging the laptop phone wire into a phone jack may pop the windows dial up connection wizzard. If not, its accessable in IE tools, internet options, under the Connections tab. Set up a new connection! You'll need the dial up phone number and your user login name and password.

I'll try to answer several of your questions. Yes, you will need a special router, but I would NOT buy the one the salesman is pushing on you. I have one made by Cradlepoint (the CTR350) which I bought at Amazon.com and did not pay nearly that much for it. It is very small and I plug the wireless "card" (modem) into a USB port on the router. Then I connect my desktop computer via Ethernet (cat 5 cable). I connect my laptop via the wireless signal sent from the router. It is very easy to set up the security on the router. In addition, I also use software firewalls on my computers. The built-in wireless in the laptop is not the same thing as what you plug in. It allows the laptop to receive and use wireless signals, and all new laptops come with this. Now whether this would be faster than your DSL is questionable. Sometimes my service with Verizon is quite fast, but at busy times, mostly evenings, it slows down quite a bit. With DSL you have a dedicated line, so your speed should remain constant. I went this route, because I cannot get DSL or cable, and I suffered over 2 years with satellite. Then Verizon's 3-G (EVDO) became available to me. You need to be fairly close to a tower to get a good, strong signal also. If your cell phone service is good, chances are the wireless Internet would be good, also. I was able to buy a used "card", which is really a modem, so that I was not locked into a contract and I can end the service at any time without penalty. So it's your call. If you are unhappy with your DSL, you might give it a try. Do they have a trial period during which you can return anything and only owe for the usage you had? If not. . . . .It's your call.

that is what I was expecting to hear but I was very surprised after explaining to them what data mining was and having them look at some things on google I did not get the you are in the dark ages line, but they know I am heavy into computers and computer security so maybe they considered that (and the fact I am the one they have to call when they have a problem). I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. And as you said if you have good kids with good smarts they can understand the issues. those little third party apps and stuff like say Christmas Cheer for example if you read the fine print you see just how much info you are signing away! Plus most of them that put out those 3rd party apps and games for facebook have no listing of their terms of service or privacy policies anywhere.

Before you go spending money, let's try a few things. When you took your router to default, everything worked fine. When you use a pass phrase, you get to the internet but web sites don't load. I have a copy of your router manual in front of me so let's try a few steps. 1------Log onto your router 2------Under the wireless setup make sure the SSID reads NETGEAR 3------Make sure the operating channel for the wireless mode.is Auto. 4------ Leave the wireless mode set to the default setting of Up to 145Mbps for 2.4GHz. 5------ Select security options for the 2.4GHz wireless network.The wireless Security Options are set to None by default. 6-----use WPA2-PSK as your security option. 7----- enter the following as your passphrase wndr3400 make all letters lower case. Select APPLY at the bottom of the screen. Under DIAGNOSTICS, select the REBOOT option. Once the router reboots, close out all your screens and reboot you computer. When prompted for a passphrase enter wndr3400 all letters must be lower case. Please post back and let us know if that did the trick.