Wired, yes; wireless, no - any suggestions?

Can you folks suggest something that I haven’t tried to re-establish wireless internet connectivity? I have a problem that doesn’t seem to me as if it should be a total melt-down of my router’s wireless capability, but I’m out of ideas for what to do.
I have a Linksys WRT54G wireless router for a home network that is normally just one laptop and a printer. The laptop can get a fully functional internet connection when wired to the router by an Ethernet cable, but zero connectivity when the Ethernet cable is disconnected. I’ve been through Linksys’ support website and a couple of other forums (including this one) and have tried what I can understand. (Some of the shorthand references are above my head.)
I have reset the router both using the reset button and using the software reset, updated the firmware to current from Linksys’s website, and rebuilt a network from scratch four times (once resetting using the reset button, once using a software reset, and twice using both before rebuilding the network). In all cases, the network icons on my laptop say that I am connected to a wireless network, the router “sees” the laptop as a wireless client, and yet on disconnecting the cable, there is no connection to the internet. At least nothing requiring an internet connection works wirelessly. (I power cycled the router at the times specified in Linksys’s instructions.)
I think I have eliminated the wireless card in my laptop as the culprit. I brought home my office laptop, connected it to the wireless network, and got the same results I get with the home laptop – it reports being connected to a wireless network, but while there is a connection to the ISP when wired to the router, there is no connection when the cable is unplugged.
Is there some kind of “super-reset” that I haven’t yet found out about? Or is the consensus that the router’s wireless internet connection is simply dead? At this point, I’m ready to accept that conclusion, but it seems strange to me that this would be true.
I can’t point to any event that seems traumatic enough to have killed the router. This all started when I was trying to re-configure a range extender and got a “conflict of IP addresses” message. Up to that point, the router worked fine; after that no wireless internet connection. Apparently IP address conflicts use heavy weaponry.

 

Just need to get some more background info from you:

1. Is there any kind of encryption on the network? As in does it ask for a passkey when you try and connect to it?

2. When you are trying to connect to the router wirelessly, does the network name show up in windows wireless network manager? (Just click on the wireless icon in the lower-right corner of the screen)

3. what operating system is on the laptop?

 

Maybe this can Help, http://www.ezlan.net/wireless.html
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Hi. In order:

1. I use WEP. It does ask for a passkey, and has accepted it each time I rebuilt the network. Once the key has been entered a first time, the "remember me" feature seems to work to put the passkey in.

2. Yes, the network name shows up.

3. The OS is XP.

Hope that gives you what you were looking for.

 

Thanks. I'm traveling today, but will see what I can do with this when I am back tomorrow.

 

So if I am correct you cannot connect at all to your wireless network, even though it appears in windows network manager.

Are there any error messages when you attempt to connect to the network?

 

It appears that is true. No, I have gotten no error messages in going through the connection routine. To be sure, I unplugged the cable, disconnected from the network, and reconnected wirelessly. The laptop reported having reconnected and there were no error messages.

To confirm that devices aren't actually connecting to the wireless network, I also tried connecting my printer (which has been sitting around neglected while I addressed the router issue with just the laptop). The printer's wireless network "wizard" operated - also without error messages - and reported that it connected to the network. However, the router's DHCP clients table did not then list the printer. (The printer is a floor away from the router at the other end of the house, so normally there is a range extender in between them, but it's pretty sensitive and can normally get a signal, although weak, without the extender.)

During all of this, the laptop continued to show up on the router's DHCP clients table, even after disconnecting the Ethernet cable and refreshing the client table.

Despite that last point, it seems that devices are not actually connecting to the wireless network, although they are reporting having done so.

 

Is there anyone near you that you can borrow a router from to see if that works?

I am also beginning to suspect router failure at this point.

 

I'll see what I can come up with. I may be able to borrow one from the office, or a friend over the next few days, and will let you know the results.

The fact that you are not finding some action that I have just overlooked is helpful by itself. Trying to figure out what to do next has burned up enough time over the last couple of weekends that declaring the router dead and just starting over is beginning to have some attractions.

 

I think we have fixed the problem.

I wasn't able to borrow a router from anyone at work, so gave up and bought another one (fortunately, and fortuitously, on sale, so not terribly painful). When I got that set up, I got the same reaction from my laptop that I had previously, but the office laptop connected like it was supposed to.

That sent me back to my home laptop, where I discovered that something in the installation of the new router had turned of the automatic DHCP function of the wireless card. Turning that back on seems to have me up and running. (At least I'm sending this message wirelessly.) At some point in the future - the far distant future - I may try reinstalling the old router to see if it still has problems.

Thanks for your help.

 

I would suggest trying the connection without the encryption and also make sure that MAC filtering is not on in the router.

Are you using a unique SSID? I ask to make sure that your not mistakenly connecting to a neighbors router.

Also know that a 2.4ghz cordless phone base near the router will interfere with the wireless signal.

You should also check the area for someone else that is running a wireless router on the same channel as you. Netstumbler works well for this.

 

Thanks for the suggestions. Netstumbler detected another network using the same channel I had setup, and changing that speeded up internet access considerably, once I got it up and running.

I will watch for interference from a 2.4 ghz phone since, in fact, I have one based about 10 feet from the router. I don't think it had been an issue with the old router, but will keep an eye on it. I've been looking at phone systems (without much urgency) for other reasons, and will go for a higher band when I change it.

As to the other points you asked about, I do use a SSID, and before scuttling the old router, had changed it several times as I re-worked the network trying to get it to work. MAC filtering is (and was) off.

I may be back: Now that the wireless connection seems to be working as it used to, I'm going to try to re-install the range extender that started the whole problem.

 

Well, I'm not quite back to square 1, but let's say square 2. Having taken care of the router problem, I then tried to add the range extender that I need to cover the lower floor of my house. This is a new extender.

I can't seem to use any of Linksys's automatic set-ups; either the extender won't "see" the router to connect to it, or the router won't see the extender. So I wired the extender to the router, and followed Linksys's manual set up instructions. Upon saving the changes, I got an "IP address conflict" message, and this terminates my computer's ability to connect to the internet through the router.

This is a replicating problem - every time I have tried to connect the extender, this IP address conflict arises and the laptop becomes disconnected. This time, resetting the router to its defaults and re-building the network from scratch seems to be solving the problem I originally asked about, and I am getting quite expert at doing that. But how do I connect this extender if automatic configuration and the "wizard" don't work, and manual connection torches my internet connectivity??

 

If you are only using a few devices, can you assign every device on the network a static IP address?

As in configure the router to have 192.168.1.254 and the range extender to have 192.168.1.253 and any computers to have 192.168.1.2 through 192.168.1.250 with a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0 and configure the computers to have a default gateway and DNS router address of 192.168.1.254

If you are unsure of how to configure this, post back and I will give detailed instructions.

 

That seems to be the answer, as I have only a couple of laptops and a printer that make up my "network," I don't know how to assign the addresses, so would appreciate instructions. Thanks.