Topic: Vista wireless internet & unseure

[Simon]

Right, rather than clearing everything, first, go into Control Panel (Classic View) > Network and Sharing Center > Manage wireless networks, then make sure your connection is at the top of the list, and clear all the other entries.  You can also right click your connection, select Properties, and you should see three boxes.  Make sure 'Connect automatically when this network is in range' is ticked, and untick 'Connect to a more preferred network if available'.  That might make it ignore any connections other than your own.

[Andy K]

yeah tried that many times

[Simon]

And what happens?  It just finds the other networks again?  I wonder if there's any way to stop it automatically searching for networks?

[Andy K]

Ok. Here is another tangent 


To be honest what I am about to say is what I thought the problem was in the first place but moved away from it (for some reason).

There are two wireless connected PC's in the house.
Router is turned off at night.

It appears I have to boot one PC up first (dell/thomson), so that it connects to the router (and takes an address ?)
Once this has happened the Vista PC (plexus) which gives me the trouble appears to be happy to connect.

Ages ago I setup/fiddled with the router settings to make it secure, not knowing what on earth i was doing.
Maybe adding fixed addresses has caused this problem ?

Due to someone going back to work today, (and leaving the Dell/thomson switched off) has pointed me in this direction.
I could well have two or more problems.

Could you experts take a look at these settings and tell me if i have set it up wrong please   
Thanks

It's a siemans router

[Simon]

Sorry Andy, I'm not familiar with that router, and only managed to connect my own more by luck than judgement, so hopefully someone else will be able to shed some light on this.  Is one of the computers connected by Ethernet cable, or is the whole set up wireless?

[Andy K]

they are both wireless

[Sandra]

The allowed MAC address for the Dell Thompson is different to the assigned address.

The MAC address should be fixed on the equipment so I would alter it on the allowed part to match the actual one and see if that works.

[Andy K]

It appears I have to boot one PC up first (dell/thomson), so that it connects to the router (and takes an address ?)
Once this has happened the Vista PC (plexus) which gives me the trouble appears to be happy to connect.

Amazing. Today I turned the router on, turn on the problem PC. And it logged in fine  ':|



I don't think there is an error with the mac addresses. The dell/thomson doesn't give me problems,
I think that is the screen resolution making the character look different. But tell me which ones you think are wroing and I will check

[topquark]

Setup looks OK to me (from the routers perspective).  When your troublesome PC does connect without a problem do you actually get allocated the IP addresses that you expect for each machine ?  If not; is one of the computers possibly set up as a static IP allocation that clashes with one of your DHCP allocated ones ?

[Andy K]

don't know, How would I check ?

Type ping on the PC ?

I have entered the last number 9 - 13 into the router to force an IP address ?

[Simon]

Would opening a command window, then typing ipconfig /all be what you're looking for?

[topquark]

Yes Simon, spot on !

Edit: you'll need to check the wireless adapter of course for the matching MAC addresses (just in case you have more than one MAC for the machine).  If there's no cable for the (assumed) ethernet port then that will show as "media disconnected" or words to that effect.

That will show which IP address has been allocated to each of the machines.  You should also do that when the machine fails to connect and check what's been allocated to the other machines.

Here's where you'll find it on vista:

[Andy K]

ipconfig /all
gave this


Windows IP Configuration

   Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : Zoostorm
   Primary Dns Suffix  . . . . . . . :
   Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
   IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
   WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
   DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : xxxxx

Wireless LAN adapter Wireless Network Connection 5:

   Connection-specific DNS Suffix  . : xxxxx
   Description . . . . . . . . . . . : RT73 USB Wireless LAN Card
   Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-B0-8C-04-F9-2C
   DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
   Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
   IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.14(Preferred)
   Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
   Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : 19 February 2009 19:13:57
   Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : 29 March 2145 02:09:15
   Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
   DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
   DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
   NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Enabled

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

   Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected
   Connection-specific DNS Suffix  . :
   Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Realtek RTL8168B/8111B Family PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet NIC (NDIS 6.0)
   Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-1F-E2-5F-F4-F2
   DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
   Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes

[topquark]

Right, so that one machine has been allocated it's 192.168.1.14 address (it's preferred address as noted in the output).  Which is correct for that one machine (comparing the MAC address and IP address from the PC with how it's set up on the router).  You now should do the same for all of the other machines that you've configured in the router for both the failing and working scenarios.  In the working scenario they should all match their configuration on the router (ie the pairing of MAC address and IP address).  Notice that this machine is also confirming that's it has been set up with both HDCP and Autoconfiguration enabled and that the subnet mask also matches.  If any of them show up with the adapter config not set to DHCP and Autoconfiguration enabled then that may be the culprit.  If everything looks OK and you can still provoke the failing scenario by starting machines in a different sequence then it's back to the drawing board for another possibility.

Code: [Select]

Wireless LAN adapter Wireless Network Connection 5:

   Connection-specific DNS Suffix  . : xxxxx
   Description . . . . . . . . . . . : RT73 USB Wireless LAN Card
   Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-B0-8C-04-F9-2C
   DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
   Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
   IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.14(Preferred)
   Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
   Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : 19 February 2009 19:13:57
   Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : 29 March 2145 02:09:15
   Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
   DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
   DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
   NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Enabled


[Andy K]

thanks. Will check the other one.

Another thing I forgot to mention....    it that another way to encourage it to connect is to boot it up and leave it alone for 3 mins or so, it will then connect. If I try to manually tell it to connect it refuses straight away without even trying.

I'm now having other issues with IE7, so I'm going to have to try and reinstall vista. Oh what fun.
I just hope it might fix this problem too.