Try again
First impressions of USRobotics' beta software were very positive. After the installation - over the top of the existing software (but with the box not connected to the PC at the time) - we made a bunch of Skype calls and not one of them ended abruptly.
Beta version
Original version
After the weekend, though, we were unable to make any Skype calls at all using the phone. Not free and not paid for.
Let's back-track just for a moment.
What you do when using the USR box to make a Skype call directly from a DECT phone is get a normal dialling tone, press the phone's hash key twice and then key in a two-numeral shortcut you've allocated for the person you're calling. Immediately after that, you press the phone's star button once.
What's supposed to happen is that the USRobotics box grabs control after you press the hash key twice - and you know that's happened because the dialling tone is replaced by a higher-pitched continuous tone.
But, in our case, instead of the USRobotics box grabbing control, we heard a recorded operator message moaning that, "The number you have dialled has not been recognised. Please check and try again".
And, the USRobotics icon in the System Tray (USR Monitor) had now changed to show that things weren't working properly. The icon had looked normal before we attempted to make a call (top version below) but now (bottom version) had a red circle around it and a red bar through it at 45 degrees - just how it looks if you turn on the PC without having the USRobotics box plugged into one of the PC's USB sockets.
The big question was, what had changed between Friday and Monday?
Well, the PC has been left running throughout and the thing we knew for sure was that four Windows XP updaters had been automatically installed and the PC had then rebooted afterwards without our having actively given permission for it to do so. Grr!
Just in case another reboot might help, we restarted the PC (we were near the stage where you reach for the chicken bones and Tarot cards) but that made no difference. So we concluded that one or more of the Windows updaters must be the culprit. Please God. Surely?
These updaters were:
1/ Security
Update for Windows XP (KB920685)
More info in the Microsoft Security Bulletin MS06-053 and in the Knowledge Base (KB) Article KB920685
2/ Update for Windows XP (KB922582)
More info in the Knowledge Base (KB) Article KB922582
3/ Update for Windows XP (KB920872)
More info in the Knowledge Base (KB) Article KB920872
4/ Security Update for Windows XP (KB919007)
More info in the Microsoft Security Bulletin MS06-052 and Knowledge Base (KB) Article KB919007
More info in the Microsoft Security Bulletin MS06-053 and in the Knowledge Base (KB) Article KB920685
2/ Update for Windows XP (KB922582)
More info in the Knowledge Base (KB) Article KB922582
3/ Update for Windows XP (KB920872)
More info in the Knowledge Base (KB) Article KB920872
4/ Security Update for Windows XP (KB919007)
More info in the Microsoft Security Bulletin MS06-052 and Knowledge Base (KB) Article KB919007
Having read the relevant documentation, our deepest suspicion fell on the two security updates (Nos 1 and 4 in the list above) but we took no chances and set about uninstalled all four...
