Automatically connect a PPPoE connection on login?

Does anyone know how to setup a Windows 7 PPPoE connection to automatically log on, when the user logs on to their W7 account?

I'm going to be putting W7 RTM on my folks machine very soon, and trying to get my mom to remember to click a shortcut under XP to connect to the ISP before she tries to send/receive mail has been a nightmare. Getting her to use the "connect to" start menu link or clicking on the systray icon under Windows 7 will be impossible I think.

We have 4 pc's using 3 different ISP's on our ADSL line so using our ADSL router to login for us is not an option.

Ah ha, figured it out.

Had to turn off "Prompt for name and password..." in the connection properties, and put a shortcut to the pppoe connection in user startup folder.

What had me fooled was finding a way to make a shortcut of the pppoe connection, which was hidden under "change adapter settings" section of the Network and Sharing Center in control panel.

Hey!

How did you make the shortcut to the internet connection?

Making the shortcut was what stumped me for a bit, but it's actually just a matter of going to the right window in W7.

Go to control panel option "Network and Sharing Center". On the left side of the window at the top, should be three options, select the middle option "Change adapter settings". You should now see your adapters and your PPPoE connection, right click on the connection you want to make a shortcut and selet "make shortcut".

Great, thanks!

I'm trying to figure out the same thing on a friend's machine. Have the proper shortcut/configuration in the startup folder but it will not connect on Windows startup. I've done this a million times on XP but it's not working on 7. If I click on the shortcut after logon it will connect np. It just won't execute the shortcut on startup. Any ideas?

Have you unchecked the box for "Prompt for name and password, certificate, etc." under the "Options" tab, in the property pages for the PPPoE connection? It might solve your problem.
(right click on your PPPoE connection in the window I mentioned in the previous post and select "properties" to get the options tab)

This of course requires you to have selected windows 7 to remember your PPPoE username and password when you logged on a some point for it to auto logon.

Yes, the box for prompt for username/password, show progress, etc are all unchecked. Like I said I've done this a million times on XP and it's always worked like a charm. I did get it to work eventually in a roundabout way. First I created a scheduled task to run at Windows startup using the rasdial command and the proper arguments. This also did not work automatically but just like the startup folder option it would work when I manually ran the task. So finally I created a batch file with the following text:

START Rasdial <connection name> <username> <password>

I then dropped the batch file into the startup folder and it auto connects like a charm. It should work by just dropping the connection shortcut into the startup folder but for some reason it wouldn't for me. At least I figured it out.

What a nightmare for people who connect using PPPoE. I was in the same situation and spent hours trying to locate a solution. As has been stated already, placing a shortcut in the startup folder can work sometimes, but not always. It didn't for me. I tried registry hacks, starting Windows with MSN launching automatically, all sorts of things to no avail. As a Firefox user I was surprised that the connection would log onto the Internet if IE was launched but when I launched Firefox the computer just said, "Meh..."

Anyway, Mconways post set me down a different path although his solution was more complicated than I could figure out. I finally came across this tiny little program that autodials a connection called CiDial available here:

Aldensoft Software - CiDial Download

Run the program and configure it selecting your appropriate connection, enter your username and password and I removed the check mark from CiDial always on top.

Drop the program into your startup folder and you should be all set to go. Whenever I start my computer there's a flash of a status and within a few second my internet connection is up.

I'm really surprised that auto connecting a PPPoE dialup isn't a common task in Windows 7, Vista or even XP. It's obvious that a lot of people use it so what would it have taken to add a switch that says, "Launch with logon". Weird.

Hope this help some of you.