Asif:
I am so desperate now that I am really thinking about taking my whole machine to one of my friends in the same area and see if it does connect from there. After that, I'll try a wireless phone service to bypass the land-line exchange altogether.
Before you go that route, but after you've tried those other suggestions (and proved that the line and exchange are good), try this:
Do you still have FC 6 (yes, six) lying about? If you hsve some empty HD real estate, install a minimal system, and see what happens. Also, a distro keeps a log of updates - correct? (I'm still learning linux.) Well, if you can pin-point (down to the month or so) the onset of this problem, check what was updated then.
