I spoke at length with Vodafone's SureSignal support. Most of that time was spent explaining to the VF tech that I did NOT need to open any ports as it was unnecessary. Sometimes it's hard to remain polite. But I remained firm and resolute and refused to open any ports.

Anyway, he attempted to do the 'reset' from his end, but explained to me that all it means is a reset of the SS itself initiated from their end as opposed to any clearing of the system at their end. This I also find hard to understand since the need to reset is undoubtedly because the SS cannot connect and if it's not connected then how can they communicate with it to tell it to reset itself? In any case, he tried to do it, but said it wasn't doing anything because the system was reporting that it wasn't receiving any data from my SS. Ha, I could have told him that. The call ended at something of an impasse. That was at about 11.30 am Friday.

24hrs later and the SS lights are still blinking in the "I've got no connection" mode.

Next day, Sunday afternoon, i.e. more than 48 hrs after the phone call and there is still no connection. I went out.

I returned about midnight last night (Sunday) and happened to notice a full signal on my iPhone. Somewhat disbelievingly I had a look at the SS lights and they show it IS connected and working perfectly. :o

This morning (Monday) it appears to still be connected and working.

While this is of course basically a good result for me, it does raise a number of issues:-

- Vodafone don't really have a clue.

- You do NOT need to open ports through NAT. That is ONLY required for a firewall (mine is off at present).

- Why does it take more than 2 days to connect. Any other device is able to set up an IPsec VPN in a matter of seconds. What is so bad about the VF SS that it takes so long?

- What actually finally kicked it into life? I haven't changed the configuration my end, VF tried a reset from their end. What was the change that allowed the connection? Or was it simply that it took over a week to get itself set up (that's how long it's been on)?

Answers on a postcard please (not really:-)

Well, that's my story. Not really much help to anyone else I guess. I would dearly love to discuss this with someone who REALLY knows what's going on here so we can get to the bottom of it.

If you've not changed anything your end - surely it has to be a change at the vodafone end.

dannyboy1121 wrote: If you've not changed anything your end - surely it has to be a change at the vodafone end.

Yes that would be my conclusion, but the VF techie insisted that their reset couldn't do anything as there was no connection with my SS. But as I said, what would be the point in them having that control when the reason to force a reset would be because of a lost connection.

It has previously been suggested that the VF reset does in fact reset the connection at their end which can apparently become hung/stuck. This would certainly match my experience as now this VF reset has been done twice when my SS could NOT connect and shortly after that, with NO changes at my end, the SS miraculously connects.

It's a shame that VF don't know their arse from their elbow or we might stand a better chance of discovering the truth.