"limited to no connectivity", euphemism for...

i recently got internet here in India. its a wired cable modem, no router. we have 2 laptops, the dell inspiron with vista is able to connect, but the one with XP does not. the tech guy from the company couldnt make it work, so he just said "reinstall windows". i did. now i've got a fresh XP install (except for some drivers) and still cannot connect.

i have tried enabling / disabling the LAN connection. powering the modem on / off....i still get "limited to no connectivity"

my tcp/ip settings are set to "obtain an IP address automatically.

i can do an "ipconfig /release", but if i try to renew the IP, i get "an error occurred while renewing interface...".

"ipconfig /all" gets me this nonsense:

IP ADDRESS . . . 0.0.0.0
SUBNET MASK . . . 0.0.0.0
DEFAULT GATEWAY
DHPC SERVER . . . 255.255.255.255

my knowledge of this stuff is slim to none. i know the connection is good, cause it works on my other machine. firewall is off, theres no anti-spyware, its a clean install. i know this IP address is b.s, can somebody tell me what i need to do here? can i do anything with the IP info from my working computer?

thanks for reading!

 

Vista Tend to have them problems... Try restarting ur internet. or maybe check ur internet setttings

 

...he said that his vista laptop was WORKING.

sorry to the OP for not bein of any help. i would wait til some of the more knowledgeable members can shine some light on yur situation.

 

how are you connecting 2 laptops without a router?

 

This a complete guess but you could try connecting your vista laptop, read off its IP address using ipconfig and then go to the XP machine and manually set its IP address (after disconnecting the Vista machine). I'd also check the modem's internal interface (which is usually accessible by opening a web browser and typing the IP address ipconfig labels as "default gateway", use the vista machine). Have a poke through and see if there is anything there which may be causing a problem. Have you tried switching off the modem and connecting the XP machine first? I know my router assigns an IP address to a computer for a 24hr period even if you disconnect it so if your DHCP settings are set to only give out 1 IP address and you connect the Vista machine first then when you connect the XP machine theres no address for it. Switching the modem off and on again should reset the assignments.

These are all just guesses but maybe one will work

Good Luck

Grand Admiral

EDIT: As to the above question I'm assuming you're either connecting them one at a time or have a modem with a built in ethernet hub?

 

Oh and to answer the question of the thread title "limited or no connectivity" means that the physical connection is working (at least partially) but the software 'layer' has a problem (like not being assigned an IP address, in your case). The 0.0.0.0 is the 'default' address in a way and as you said is b.s, you can't do anything with it. Either your modems DHCP system needs to assign you an address or you need to set one yourself.

Grand Admiral

 

First off, the tech guy is a nut job...he made u waste ur time for no obvious reason. What i'd like to know is what kind of Modem do u have?...look at it and tell me the name and model number....because AFAIK if it's a "modem"; most likely it's not "wireless" therefore u will need a wireless router to add to ur current network, if u want to have the other laptops connect to the Internet. So please let me know the model # and brand of modem u have!

 

the modem says "Scientific Atlanta 2100"... there is no other labeling or info on it. as i said its wired, so we could only connect one computer at a time right now, even if they did both work.

the guy who came to set it up did set up the vista machine (which works) first, and then failed to set up the XP machine successfully. so it could be some kind of IP assignment thing.. but im talking out my *** now because i dont know anything about it.

im in a beach town in india, where many locals who have internet have never heard of a router. im pretty sure the internet guys had never heard of one. if i can lay my hands on one it wont be easy. but anyway i dont think the internet guys were accustomed to the concept of having multiple computers in a household. ive heard its not so easy to just plug into someone elses connection... so maybe the modem is rather dim-witted with regards to adjusting to different computers? again, i dont know a thing about how modems work, so just guessing randomly.

 

Okay...so u have a wired modem, which means only one computer will connect to the modem at a time. So now that i've read over ur info. I think that u should take a look at GrandAdmiral's suggestion in post #5.

*In a nutshell u will take a look at the Vista machine's ipconfig info. Click on Start-->All Programs-->Accessories and right click on Command Prompt and run as administrator. Put in an admin username and password and type ipconfig /all in the command prompt window and hit enter. Take note of that info [ip address, subnet mask, default gateway and dns server address] then do an ipconfig /release. Then go to the XP computer, and manually enter those ip settings to the LAN card; by going to the "Network Connections" folder, right click on the LAN card and choose properties; Select "Internet Protocol" in the list (you may have to scroll down) and select properties and enter the info. u got from the Vista machine.

 

Do you do an ipconfig /renew after doing a release? Have you tried doing a static setup on the XP box? Have you tried using the windows repair function (right click on wirless> select repair)?

 

liquidxit2 is likely on the right track given your setup.

To simplify things.

With modem plugged in

Turn on with Vista computer from complete off state. Check internet.
Start, type
cmd
in search box. In a moment, at the top you will see Programs, and underneath this, you will see cmd.exe. Right click this, choose RUN AS ADMINISTRATOR

(ipconfig requires elevated privilidges to run in vista)

in the black box, at the command prompt, type
ipconfig /release
<enter>

Shut down the VISTA machine


With XP machine off
disconnect network cable from VISTA machine and connected it to XP machine.

Turn on XP machine.

From an off state, XP will ask for an IP address--if your other computer has released it's previous IP addres from step above, you should get one--ipconfig will not be necessary

Once on, check internet. This should work in most cases...however there are two possibilities where it will not

a) you never mentioned what kind of internet connection you have. Cable? DSL? PPPoE? PPPoA? Some broadband connections require a login--this is normally handled by your modem, but in some cases, your modem may be set up in bridge mode, which means that the PC needs to handle authentication

b) MAC address filtering. Some ISPs provision internet service based on a mac address. The MAC address is hard-coded into your NIC--all network devices have a MAC address and every single one in the entire world is different (well, unless there was a horrible mistake at the factory, whcih believe it or not happened to me one--got a whole batch of NIC cards with identical mac addresses--took days to figure out what was going on). When the ISP tech provisioned your internet connection, at some point in the process he may have had input the MAC address. When your computer turns on and asks for an ip address, the remove ISP server responsible for assigning you one will say, "Uh uh you are not allowed on our network with that MAC address."

Home routers get around this by "cloning" the mac address (you may have seen this in router manuals). You connect the permitted machine, clone the MAC address from it, and then the router handles the authentication using the cloned MAC address.

MAC address filtering for authenticating is very rare in north America these days, but given your description, it is possible that your ISP is doing this to prevent multiple people from using internet without paying for it.

 

Enable the zero configuration service on your XP computer.

 

He's trying via a wired connection wirelessman ...I don't think that would help.

 

Ahhh, you know that I hate to read.......

Thanks.

 

I know how it is..I am like that myself sometimes.

 

im not sure i get all this, here is what i tried:

form ipcponfig on the working machine i get:

IPv4 Address . . . 116.68.64.222
Subnet Mask . . . 255.255.248.0
Default Gateway . . . 116.68.64.1

at least thats what comes up first, among a lot of other gobbledygook.

i tried putting that into the non-connecting machine under LAN properties > TCP/IP ... where it would normally say "optain ip address automatically"

it didnt seem to have any effect, except that after putting numbers in, windows could do a "repair" without throwing an error, whereas normally it cant complete the process.

im beginning to suspect the internet company has some kind of system where they set up your home account to work for one machine only. it sounds crazy, and i dont know how it would work, but my friend has the same kind of connection and i cannot connect to his line at all with my computer. only his own machine works. anybody ever hear of companies doing things like that? i never heard of it in the states, but it seems like thats how they do it here. is it possible? would they have to grab the IP off my computer and save it in a DB at the company when i first connected? im going to choke that tech when i get him back here.

 

did you read my post?

I explained exactly how they could do it..but you have not yet provided enough information to determine which way they might have done it.

On your father's working VISTA machine,

Start > CONTROL PANEL > NETWORK AND SHARING CENTER, choose MANAGE NETWORK CONNECTIONS on the left

Describe what you see in the window that appears

 

I don't really know anything about it but this sounds like MAC Cloning!
I could be wrong, if so excuse my ignorance. Shyster, Wirelessman?

 

It seems to me that the IP addresses are typical of a company (Class A), not of a residential type.

I would check if these values have been setup on the adapter, and remove them, then check that they are obtained automatically. Do Ipconfig/release and ipconfig/renew. And make sure your router has DHCP enable.

 

Thats a static IP address. Meaning your laptop has the address for your internet. This is common when the gateway or modem has one Ethernet port and it assigns the static IP to your PC.