Can ping but not browse internet

I recently bought a netgear WGT624 wireless router to allow my desktop and laptop to share an internet connection. After much work, I have this problem: when connected to the router (with a cable) the desktop can ping websites but cannot browse them. In addition, it can receive E-mail but cannot send it (using Outlook Express). It works fine when connected directly to my DSL modem. The laptop has no problem browsing the net, either when connected directly by cable to the router or when using the wireless function. Both computers use Windows XP. My modem is a sprint 645 series DSL modem. I've spent hours on the phone with both Netgear and Sprint. I never was able to communicate directly with the router using my desktop to set it up. I eventually hooked my laptop up to it directly to set it up (following the phone directions of the Netgear technician). They first said that it was a problem with the modem, so I called sprint. Sprint walked me through the modem settings and said that it was fine and had the same settings that they use for their routers. They said to tell Netgear that the modem is bridged and so should be no problem. That is when I called Netgear back and they walked me through setting up the router from the laptop. At that point they said that it was a problem with my browser on the desktop and they could not help me. I've tried using my Windows XP cd to remove and then restore IE, but that doesn't seem to help. Since the laptop seems to work fine, I'm sure that it is just a problem with some setting on the desktop. For now I'm back to a straight connection with my modem and it works fine. Can anyone help me?

 

Sounds like your firewall is interfereing.
What firewall are you using?

 

Have you checked your browser settings to make sure someone hasn't replaced them with some funky non-working proxy settings?

 

Thank you for your post. I was using zonealarm, but disabled it.

 

I don't think proxy settings are a problem. When I go to Internet options, connections, LAN settings, nothing is checked, including the proxy box. Is there somewhere else that I should check?

 

Do you have anything listed in program control like:

Generic host process for win32. or Internet Explorer?

If you do, remove them.

Never deny or block either of these.

 

I did find both of these programs and changed zone alarm settings to allow internet access, but it still does not work. In any case I have been trying it with Zone Alarm disabled.

 

In case you haven't noticed I ignored ZA being disabled, because if its malfunctioning, no amount of disabling it will make a difference.

 

Are you pinging by name or Ip address?

 

We tried both yesterday when I had the Netgear tech on the phone and both worked. I just tried pinging www.yahoo.com and www.google.com again and got responses from both.

 

Can you post the results of a traceroute to yahoo?

tracert yahoo.com > C:\trace.txt

This will save the output to a file that you can post the contents here.

 

I tried it three times, pinging between tries (successfully), and each time it timed out. Here is a sample: Tracing route to yahoo.com [216.109.112.135]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 * * * Request timed out.
2 * * * Request timed out.
3 * * * Request timed out.
4 * * * Request timed out.
5 * * * Request timed out.
6 * * * Request timed out.
7 * * * Request timed out.
8 * * * Request timed out.
9 * * * Request timed out.
10 * * * Request timed out.
11 * * * Request timed out.
12 * * * Request timed out.
13 * * * Request timed out.

 

How odd.
Notice how it times out, even on your default gateway (first hop)?

 

Can you try to browse, send email and trace from SafeMOde w/ Networking?

Some wireless cards work there, some do not.

 

Have you set the default gateway to be the IP of the router?

 

I tried safe mode and nothing works. The browser doesn't find my home page (google.com), tracert times out again, and instead of outlook express it tried to load outlook 2000. It still pings yahoo fine.

 

I'm not sure how to do this. I know that the Netgear techs I talked to were very concerned about the IP addresses of both the router and the modem and had me check and recheck them.

 

Does your router contain error logs?

What do they show?

 

The only thing that the router log contains is an entry for when I initialized it this morning.

 

Back to what Goldy was saying, are you specifying your IP and other settings manually?

 

No, I haven't set any IP addresses manually. I think that everything is set to obtain IP addresses automatically. I looked in control panel, network connections, lan, properties, internet protocol, properties. Is there somewhere else that I should look?

 

No.

Humor me a little on this one.

Uninstall Zone Alarm, and see if it helps.

Make certain that the True Vector service (viewable in services.msc) is gone afterwards, too.

 

I uninstalled zone alarm and checked to make sure that true vector is also gone but it still doesn't work.

 

Have you updated the nic driver to the latest version? Have you tried changing the channel on the router?

 

I haven't done either of these things. I'm not sure how to update the nic driver. As for the channel, isn't that just for the wireless communication?

 

Well, yeah. Arent you connecting to the router, wirelessly?

 

Yes, I'm using my laptop with a wireless connection to type this. It is my desktop that doesn't work and it is connected with a cable.

 

I see.

Does the desktop have SP2 installed?

 

I'm sorry but I don't think that I know what sp2 is. How do I check?

 

start, run, winver

Click OK

Read the build number.

 

Version 5.1 Build 2600.xpsp2.030422-1633:service pack 1

 

I would rename C:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts file.

Take a look at this too.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;[LN];811259

 

I tried renaming the file that you mentioned and nothing changed. I also looked at the website that you suggested and ran the test on the winsock that it talked about. It passed the test with no problem.

 

Well, check it in msinfo32 vs. the entries in the article.

I know the winsock works, I was more concerned of what might be in it.

 

I tried msinfo32 and everything is the same except that I have 10 entries named msafd netbios... instead of 6.

 

Well, I am at a loss. Only thing I can think of is to try another Network card.

 

Could the network card be bad even though it works fine when connected directly to the modem? Also, do you think that it would do any good to reload windows?

 

Well if its not hardware related, reloading windows (specifically, a clean installation) would fix it.

It could be the NIC, we have issues documented in the internal (Microsoft) KB of similar and stranger issues being related to a dying network card.

 

Alright, I'll think more about these three things: the nic, reloading windows, and trying a new network card. In the meantime maybe someone else will read these posts and have a brainstorm. Thank you very much for all the time that you have spent trying to help me!

 

Well I finally got it working (mostly). I updated the driver for the network card. That didn't make a difference. I reinstalled windows. That didn't help. Finally I installed a new network card. Now I have two network connections since the old one is built onto the motherboard. But the new card seems to work better. I can now send mail as well as receive it and I can use the internet, for a while. Everything works fine when I first boot up, but after a little while my personal Ebay page is no longer accessible. I can go to Ebay's homepage and sometimes get to my Ebay that way, but sometimes not even then. Even when I have it called up, it won't refresh. While this is happening I can call up any other page that I want. Eventually though, if I leave it long enough without rebooting (a matter of hours) it won't let me call up any internet page. After I reboot everything works fine again, for a while, and then it starts all over again. Does anyone know what could be wrong now?

 

Sure sounds like a memory leak for this new issue.

Thanks for posting back about the new NIC helping.

What is the time frame when this happens, is it always the same?

 

No it doesn't always seem to be the same. Sometimes even after I reboot (leaving it off for a few minutes before restarting) it still won't work right. Yesterday it even showed half my favorites as grey, and said that they weren't available offline. A few minutes later they were available again. Several times when I try to check Email or call up a website it has said that I am working offline. If I say to go online, it will then check the Email. In addition, I have been trying to set up my computers to share certain files across the network and have had a problem. In the course of troubleshooting it, I tried to ping my laptop from the desktop and was unable to, even though the laptop was communicating with the internet at the time. Does any of this make any sense?

 

Yeah it does. Sounds like a memory leak.

Let me find an article...

 

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;310353

Try this--see if the problem persists while in a clean boot.

 

Thank you again for your suggestions. I tried a clean boot several times with the same result, the problem persists. Email works consistently, but the IE doesn't work. Sometimes it will call up my Ebay page for a few tries before failing, but after a few minutes it stops working, sometimes just for that page and sometimes for any page (it has taken me a couple of tries to post this). On a couple reboots it wouldn't even work the first time. This is with everything disabled that the article said to disable: process system.ini, process Win.ini and load startup items check boxes. I also disabled all microsoft services on the services tab. Even when this problem occurs, I am able to ping web sites. I don't know if it is related but I still cannot ping my laptop computer from the desktop or vice versa.

 

Hi

Try this and it should work

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=40712 This is the trhread that I got the answer from....

This was wonderful.. almost 8 hrs I was try all kinds of things..

http://www.acrodata.com/WinsockXPFix.zip

 

Thank you for your suggestion. Unfortunately, it didn't help. I ran the winsockxpfix and still have the same problem.