Dial-up boxes

I have a technical conundrum. It is to do with dial-up boxes. I know that no-one uses dial-up except me any more, but if you can try to cast your minds back it would be much appreciated. Take these two dial-up boxes:

The one on the left is the Good dial-up box. This is the one that Outlook Express makes. This one connects you to the internet and generally causes joy and happiness.

The one on the right is the Evil dial-up box. This is the one Firefox makes and also I think Internet Explorer does too. This one is rubbish. Let me explain why.

First of all, the Evil Dial-up box doesn’t work. This I can live with, because I have the Good dial-up box. I have need for the Evil box, as I have the Good dial-up box.

But here is the thing. When one is offline the Good dial-up box thinks to itself, ‘Oooh look, he is offline. I will sit here quietly in the background and not do anything, because I am not required’. Not so the Evil dial-up box. It thinks to itself ‘Oooh look, he is offline. I wonder if he wants to go online? I think I’ll just pop up and ask.’ This then means that when I am typing a document the cursor will suddenly go into the Username field of the Evil dial-up box and the flow of my work and concentration will be interrupted. Unfortunately the Evil dial-up box is too stupid to not repeat its mistake a minute later, and a minute after than, and so on.

If someone can explain how to make the Evil dialup box go away I would be most pleased. I have tweaked every blessed setting there is, but there must be another blessed setting that I have not tweaked. Thank you!