Why is my Earthlink connection dropping after ten minutes?

I haven't used a dialup connection on my Mac for a while now that wireless Internet access seems to have become so pervasive, something I'm appreciative of as the faster speed is much appreciated (and so is not having to pay $10-$20/month for the dialup service in the first place) but fortunately I have some vague memories of how to configure the modem on Mac OS X and that's what we need to do. :-)

Start by going to Apple --> System Preferences, then click on Network. You'll see something like this:

As you can see, my active connection is wireless, but I can still step through configuring the modem so you can see exactly where you need to disable that ten minute disconnect timer in the modem configuration. To do this, click on the Internal Modem and then choose Configure.... Now you'll see something like this:

Almost there. Your configuration will actually have the fields filled in for your Earthlink connection, of course, but regardless, the key button here is PPP Options. Click on that and you'll finally see where that ten minute disconnect timer can be found (and changed!):

Notice the third item down: Disconnect if idle for 10 minutes. That's the culprit!

You can fix this problem by either simply unselecting this option entirely, in which case the modem should stay connected to Earthlink until you explicitly disconnect, or just change that (rather short, I admit) 10 minutes to 60 minutes or similar, just to ensure that you don't end up accidentally connected for 24-48 hours or longer one weekend.

That should help you lose that pesky 10 minute disconnect and make you a happy Earthlink customer again. Good luck!