I use hardy ubuntu and set up the vpn through the network manager with the cisco vpn. When I'm in Rolla (fidelity if that matters) it connects 100% of the time, no problem. When I'm visiting parents in St. Louis, I'd say it connects about 5% of the time. Most of the time it tries to connect and after 10 seconds it says



I'm thinking maybe it has something to do with the timeout since it needs a little more time to connect from St. Louis but I can't figure out how to change the timeout setting.

A handshake shouldn't take more than 10 seconds to establish a vpn connection. This sounds more like a firewall issue, first check on your router to see if it has ipsec passthrough enabled. If that's not the issue, it might be an issue on the ISP's side.

It seems like all the settings are correct since it just did it right now perfectly in maybe 3-5 seconds. ipsec passthrough is enabled, otherwise I don't think that I'd be able to connect now. I don't change anything, so I don't think it's my computer or router. Sometimes it works and sometimes it just doesn't. It doesn't work more often than not in St. Louis. The reason I think it's a timeout issue is because of the difference between St. Louis and Rolla. When I'm in Rolla vpn connects fast (3-5 seconds is slow in Rolla) and connects often (95%+). I have very little trouble with vpn in Rolla. When I'm in St. Louis, I notice that it connects slower and sometimes seems to make it just before the 10 second cutoff. I think that maybe if I gave it just 5 more seconds it wouldn't get cutoff but I don't know.

I've been having issues with VPN lately as well (using windows, if it makes a big difference). I am using the same settings that have worked all though last semester. Nothing on my end has changed. I wonder if there is some sort of maintenance going on for the summer.

Mine is a fairly ongoing problem since last December. Everytime I go home I have the problem but so far very little trouble with it in Rolla.

I'm leaning more and more towards timeout. I'm in Rolla and my internet is slow and vpn is working sporadically. Anyone know how to change the timeout to more than 10 seconds for times of slow internet?

Some of the nicer people from IT finally accepted that there is a problem and it should now be fixed. My understanding is that something was wrong with the VPN box and that the traffic shaper was filtering VPN traffic. This means that it should now work again with the current version of VPNC, if you're one of the people who's had to drop to an older version. Also, the reason it worked in Rolla was because you were on Fidnet, which has a backdoor to campus.

If you have more problems, don't hesitate to submit a ticket.

I figured out how to set up PPTP VPN in Rolla, so I'll see if it works this weekend in St. Louis. I'll also give the cisco a try also. It's pretty nice when everyone else in the house using windows is fighting over the PPTP VPN while you're using cisco.