Rant issuettes with Orange Livebox

I'm trying to get an orange livebox working in france (it's a totally french contract etc (and the instructions don't have an english version)).

I can get it to the point where you log into their system. it reports the adsl line working fine @1.2mbps. but the thing where you log in initially keeps on timing out, so the internet connection part doesn't actually work.
it was working last week unreliably.
it's not an imported box or anything, born and bred in france.
Anyone know of anything wierd with this setup?
Also the wifi part does not give you an ip address, nor let you specify one. (limited con). all in all it's a bit crappy really. and the helpline is french and i'm not exactly fluent. i suspect changing it would be more hassle than it's worth!
thanks for any help!
profqwerty

 

Swap it for a netgear DG834?

 

That's probably what I'm gonna do

 

Just incase you weren't aware, a Livebox requires you to put it in "pairing mode" to connect to it wirelessly. Press 1 to do this and the wireless light should start to flash. It will stay in this mode for 10 mins, during this time you should be able to connect wirelessly without issue.

I also came across an instance at work where certain Intel laptop wifi chips wouldn't connect for some weird reason. A driver update resolved that.

 

For some reason this morning checked it (left it on for about 24hours trying to connect) and it was online! The wifi started working too - even with the pairing mode on, it still didn't seem to want to connect via wifi till it was online (ethernet cable worked though). Anyway, issue is resolved now thank god! It was already an expensive mobile bill, after just 2 days!