Internet connection problems Can anyone help?

[Andy1845c]

Well, I know this isn't a computer help forum, but some of you seem to know alot about computers, and this is the **** chat section, so here goes....

A few days ago my home computer lost its internet connection. It worked fine when I got home, it wouldn't connect an hour later. Nothing got moved or unplugged in that time, nor were any settings changed or anything installed.

It is connected though a cable modem, no router or anything involved.

I called the cable company, thinking it was on their end. They said they showed a weak signal and sent a tech out today. He also showed a poor signal, and replaced the drop from the power pole.

After doing that, he said the signal at the modem was excellent. But it still wouldn't connect to the internet.

He tried a differnt modem. Didn't work.

He gave up and said the problem was on my end and suggested the network card burned out.

The computer is an E machine and the network card is part of the motherboard. I had a PCI type network card that was working when I removed it from a differnt computer a few weeks ago around, so I put that in and disabled the built in card, the computer "sees" the new card and seems to recognize it, but still have no connection.

Running IPCONFIG from the command prompt yeilds 0.0.0.0

The enet lights on the modem and the light on the network card light up green. The cable tech siad that was a sign the modem was connected to the computer and the enet cable was okay.

Thats my saga.

Does anyone have an idea what else I could try? Or does anyone also visit a good computer forum I could ask about this on?

 

[Rolf]

Did you install the card driver?

Well, I know this isn't a computer help forum, but some of you seem to know alot about computers, and this is the **** chat section, so here goes....

A few days ago my home computer lost its INTERNET connection. It worked fine when I got home, it wouldn't connect an hour later. Nothing got moved or unplugged in that time, nor were any settings changed or anything installed.

It is connected though a cable modem, no router or anything involved.

I called the cable company, thinking it was on their end. They said they showed a weak signal and sent a tech out today. He also showed a poor signal, and replaced the drop from the power pole.

After doing that, he said the signal at the modem was excellent. But it still wouldn't connect to the INTERNET.

He tried a different modem. Didn't work.

He gave up and said the problem was on my end and suggested the network card burned out.

The computer is an E machine and the network card is part of the motherboard. I had a PCI type network card that was working when I removed it from a different computer a few weeks ago around, so I put that in and disabled the built in card, the computer "sees" the new card and seems to recognize it, but still have no connection.

Running ICONIC from the command prompt yeilds 0.0.0.0

The enet lights on the modem and the light on the network card light up green. The cable tech siad that was a sign the modem was connected to the computer and the enet cable was okay.

Thats my saga.

Does anyone have an idea what else I could try? Or does anyone also visit a good computer forum I could ask about this on?

Card Drivers
Most operating systems today use drivers that work with the operating system to interface with the various cards that are installed. Usually when a card in installed on a system, a driver program must also be installed to enable the computer to use the card.

 

[Andy1845c]

Okay. I guess that makes sense. I have just plugged one in and had it work, but that was a windows 2000 machine, and what i'm working with now is XP home.

Is it common for network cards to just roll over and die? Does the bad network card explanation seem likly? I hate to go buy one if there is somthing else I should check first.

 

[Rolf]

You can say that.........

Okay. I guess that makes sense. I have just plugged one in and had it work, but that was a windows 2000 machine, and what i'm working with now is XP home.

Is it common for network cards to just roll over and die? Does the bad network card explanation seem likly? I hate to go buy one if there is somthing else I should check first.

I have lost several in the last ten years and I always keep a spare one on hand, they have a habit of dying on the weekend.

 

[Andy1845c]

Okay, well, I guess they don't look to be too expensive, i'll pick one up tomarrow and see if it fixes the problem.

Maybe you can answer this though, is it okay to just disable the built in card and use the PCI slot one? Or is that somthing that may cause conflicts?

Thanks for the help

 

[Rolf]

Okay, well, I guess they don't look to be too expensive, i'll pick one up tomarrow and see if it fixes the problem.

Maybe you can answer this though, is it okay to just disable the built in card and use the PCI slot one? Or is that somthing that may cause conflicts?

Thanks for the help

Make sure it has the CD with it. Never had a one that was built in but I would think that in order to avoid conflicts you should disable the one on the mother board. It should not make any difference which PCI slot you use.

 

[picasm]

I assume you have the network by default using DHCP to get it's IP address.
Usually if you unplug the network cable the pc just makes-up a dummy local address 169.254.x.x .
If the network is working but the DHCP mechanism fails for some reason, then you get 0.0.0.0
Explained in this article:
**broken link removed**

Reasons for this can be that the dhcp service has stopped for some reason or dhcp requests are being blocked by either the windows or other firewall software or possibly faulty anti-virus software.

Try checking your firewall software logs and also the system event log for any explanation.
Check that the dhcp service is running. If it has stopped and you cannot re-start it then have you changed any firewall or antivirus software recently?

 

[Andy1845c]

Well, I'm back online. I'm not totally sure how, but its working again. I checked with the manufacturer of my PCI network card and was told WindowsXP had a built in driver for it. I downloaded what was on their site for XP and installed it anyway, no luck.

picasm - what you said went semi over my head, but it did get me thinking. I decided to just run my restore CDs and reinstall windows to see if that fixed some internal problem. It didn't work with the built in card, but the PCI one worked fine, without even installing the driver.

So, bottom line, its working, but I wish I knew what actually happened

Thanks so much for the help though! I rerally do appreciate it

 

[Sceadwian]

I'd wager that there was never anything wrong with your PC or network card, it was likley a glitch on the cable line when the line was changed out, the configurations can take a while to reset. You should have borrowed a router as you can test the PC's network card by seeing if it can connect to the router before going through such drastic measures. Often simply turning power off to both the PC and the cable modem for a length of time then turning on the modem first letting it sync then turning on the PC will solve configuration mixups. Works for me all the time.

 

[Andy1845c]

I don't think it was that simple. everything was powered off all weekend, and the problem was the same tonight before I reinstalled.

 

[Sceadwian]

You changed so many different things all at once when there was a problem you'll probably never be able to figure out the root cause.

 

[Marks256]

Even though i hate dell so very much, i must say that eMachines burn out more than Dells. Even if it isn't the whole computer that burns out. Nowadays it is just getting cheaper to get a whole new computer than just replace a simple motherboard...

I guess in your case, Andy, you were just one of the unlucky ones! If your onboard really did actually burn out, you should be able to just use a PCI ethernet card. The windows drivers would have been fine (as they usually make windows happier... )

 

[Andy1845c]

Yeah, I don't know that I will ever buy an E machine again. I'd like to build my own custom PC, but don't have the bucks or knowledge to dive in and try.

Yeah, i'll never know the why of my problem, but atleast its fixed. I tend to reinstall windows whenever somthing goes wrong because I don't know how to fix anything, lol
I just keep my files on a serperate HD so its not a big deal really.

 

[theinfamousbob]

If we're talking about ethernet cards, there's one 10/100 I swear by. The D-Link DFR-530TX+. The thing works in everything I've thrown it in, including old PCI Macs with easily found drivers. I've never had the card fail and it works 98 thru XP. It might be a little bit more expensive than a Belkin, but I have had enough problems with Belkin and their ethernet cards.