Cant connect to internet.

hello guys. A friend of mine asked me to try and make his computer connect tot he internet but I cant seem to make it work. He use to connect using dialup AOL service and now he has cable internet. I think all the "internet options" are ok. I made it automatically detect the settings. I think the problem might be the drivers but Im just speculating. Do you guys have any ideas? Perhaps using command prompt or something, Im stumped. I would appreciate it, and so would my friend.


-J

 

going to need a little more info on the problem. go into command prompt and type ipconfig and tell us what that says. and the layout he has from his modem to comp would be helpful as well.

 

Ok, I went into command prompt and typed ipconfig and got this:

Ethernet adapter local area connection:

Connection--specific DNS suffix:
Autoconfiguration IP address: 169.254.84.193
Subnet mask: 255.255.0.0
Default gateway:



(so only values for ip adress and subnet mask)

The computer is hooked up to my network right now. I have a modem/router that is connected to the computer through an ethernet cable (green light of network card is on). The router/modem is working fine. since I am connected wirelessly to it, and I also connected my other computer through an ethernet cable.

 

ok, your network abviously works fine if youre here. but his network is the one that i will need specifics about to understand the problem. as it is right now he isnt getting an IP that he can use. the 169.254 ip address is an ip that comes up when youre not getting dhcp. he might need a router to provide this. if he has a router, it could be that dhcp isnt on on the router or the router could be bad. also make sure that the cable modem is plugged into the WAN port on the router, and his computer is plugged into one of the other ports.

 

Thanks for the response Kingsteve.

What is dhcp and how do i check if it is on on my router? Im pretty sure the router is not the problem because I hook up my desktop using the same cable and it works fine. I could be wront though.

Oh, by the ways i scanned the computer with AVG antivirus,AVG antispyware, and ad-aware 2007. They all found numerous infections including some dialers. I wanted to scan with spybot but it wont let me without updating. I disabled system restore and ran a smart scan on ad-aware again and it caught a few more items. I am hesitant to keep on running scans since i cannot install updates on these programs. Could they be to blame for the lack of a connection? Is it possible to update the programs manually without an internet connection?

By the way, the icon that pops up when you connects comes on the ones that says" connected at 100 mbps". Dont know if that is relevant.

 

im confused. is the problem with your friends computer on your network or is the problem on his network?

 

the computer does not go to the internet. on any network.

 

and when the computer is plugged in, the message that comes up says its connected and is still getting the 169.254 ip address on both networks?

 

I dont know what it says on his network, he just told me it wont connect. That value came up when connected to my network. Do you think this could be more of a virus/malware issue?

 

i was asking to see if it was a problem with the NIC. but if it says its connected and just not getting an IP, the nic is fine and could be a problem with something else. your network and router seem to be working fine if your computer connects and whatnot. if you tried the cable he was using and that works fine, that rules out a bad cable. last small and simple idea would be to just disable and renable the nic. that sometimes works. if that dosnt even do anything, then im either overlooking something or the problem is out of my jurisdiction(spelling not included). i like to try to help though. if you get it figured out, let me know what the problem was.


as far as malware goes, i just dont know. try to post your questions about the malware and malware removal software in that section. i dont want to give you wrong information on that. alot of that stuff is out of my league.

sorry i couldnt be more help
hope you get the problem fixed. good luck!

 

what is the NIC and how do i disable and enable it? Is it in the "network connections" window where you can disable and enable a connection?

I will try to post about this in the malware section, thanks for replying. I'll let you know what the problem is.

-J

 

NIC is the network interface card, be it a PCI add-on card or built into the board.

I've had a problem like this twice - in the first I was able to (just like KingSteve said)
disable the NIC in the Device manager, then reenable it. That cleared up the problem and allowed the NIC to acquire an address from the router. On the second instance, this didn't correct the problem - it seemed the NIC was "locked" in some way. Since the PC was running Windows XP, instead of disabling/re-enabling the card I uninstalled it with Device Manager and re-booted the PC. XP found the "New Hardware" and installed the drivers for it. The NIC was now able to aquire an address from the router.
(I did write down the exact type of NIC the PC had, in case XP failed to have the correct drivers - ya just never know.)

I never did discover what had caused the problem. In both instances, the PC's in question had been working fine on different LAN's, but suddenly just quit accepting DHCP from routers. Nor has the problem occured again to those particular PC's, to my knowledge.

 

If you mean the connections tab in internet explorer
it should be set to

either never dial aconnection or
dial whenever a network is not present.

The LAN settings tab should leave
the automatically detect settings
and the script boxes

BOTH UNTICKED

In network connections

The properties box of the LAN should show TCP/
IP properties as


Automatic for both settings.

 

Thanks for replying guys. I tried the disable/enable thing and it didnt work.

Yea, thats what I meant with automatically detect LAN settings. That was a problem I had once a few years ago on my computer and doing what you said fixed it.


I Fixed the problem by downloading manual updates and installing them for, AVG antivirus, spybot search and destroy, and ad-aware and running scans. I also installed sygate firewall. and upon restarting everything worked. I am now typing from the computer in question. Guess there was malware using up all the ports?

THank you all for your help.

 

Glad you got it done - it's easy to get one of the settings adrift.

Unfinished automatic updates are a pain, I'm always being called to pcs where I switch on let the update finish and bingo it works.

 

good stuff man. glad you got it fixed.