I just did a fresh (re)installation of Mandrake and chose to do everything by hand instead of using the (buggy...) GUI tools.

I have ADSL (uses pptp on a Alcatel Speedtouch _Ethernet_ modem). I can start the pptp connection just fine, it gets the usually info (my IP, DNS IPs), but for some reason it won't add the default route automatically. In the /etc/ppp/options file (which I specify in the pptp command) I have the line "defaultroute" which should, afaik, add a default route to the 'other end' (I'm not sure what that's normally called) of the pptp connection. For some reason it doesn't. It says something like "default route not added". I guess I should've written down the message. The pptp connection itself is fine, and when I add the default route manually I have access to the internet.

Does anyone know why this happens?

It has worked on a previous installation, but I used the Mandrake Control centre then.

To answer my own questions, I now know why the defaultroute option with PPP doesn't work: I already had a default route (to 0.0.0.0 ...). If I delete the default route first and then start the pptp connection it picks up the new default route.

Now I have to find out where that (incorrect) default route is set... I'm using Mandrake 8.1, and I used to networking 'wizard' during the installation to set up my two network cards. I'm not really familiar with the boot process, can anyone give a hint where that default route is set?

have you checked in /ect/ppp/ or in /etc/resolve.conf?