I've had problems connecting to BT Anytime the last few days. After dialling I often get silence, nil, zilch - no data tone at all. Even tried ringing from my 'phone and got the same - so it wasn't the PC. Customer Service were unhelpful and put it down to the volume of traffic (probably true). hey, they are based in Exeter....I might just pay them a visit!
Don't get too excited about BT increasing the "gain" on your 'phone line. It's best set to "3" for optimum performance in most (but not all) cases. Increasing the gain also increases the noise on the line - a frequent cause of drop outs etc. It's worth a call to 151 to get the gain set though.