Networking help required

E

elfman66

Geek Trainee
Can anyone please help?

We are trying to add a third pc to our wireless network (we are not sure how we managed to add the second pc :-/).

We have our main pc running XP wired to an ADSL wireless 11g firewall router (3com) and a laptop connected via a wireless adapter. We would now like to add an older pc running Windows 98. This pc has a Belkin 802.11g wireless network card in it and we can see our network from the pc but can't access the internet.

It must be something simple but we are not experts and have tried everything we can think of.

Has anyone got any suggestions to get our son on the internet....please!!
 
OK, I hope you're familiar with the basics of networking as this may get a little involved. I'm presuming that you've installed the drivers correctly and that your Win 98 box can talk to the other three computers. I'm also making the assumption that the router runs a DHCP service (Dynamic Host Control Protocol - where the server automatically assigns IP addresses to the client machines as opposed to a fixed IP address system) and a DNS service to the computers on the network.

Therefore what you need to do is set the Win 98 box to look for the routers DHCP services. If memory serves me correctly you do this by going into Start -> Control Panel -> Network Connections -> right-click on the Local Area Connection icon and choose properties -> select Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) from the list -> select the radio button that's labelled something like "Automatically obtain an IP address", under the box labelled DNS or something similiar enter the IP address of the router and then click OK a few times until Windows tells you you need to reboot.

When the computer reboots you should hopefully be online. If not, run the usual tests (ping, ipconfig, etc) and let me know what you get.
 
We did what you suggested but unfortunately this didn't work. When we try to ping the router it just comes back with 'timed out'. It is frustrating as we have a signal strength of 94% from the router but seem to be blocked from connecting the internet. Do you have any other suggestions?
 
In that case try assigning a static IP address to the computer in the same subnet as the router and see if you can ping the router then. Also can you show me the output from running "ipconfig" from the Win 98 box as well as the Win XP box as I'd like to see if there is some clue there as to what is wrong.
 
Tried assigning a static ip address, still didnt work :-( Here is the ipconfig info from the Windows 98 pc.

c:/windows>ipconfig

Windows 98 IP configuration

0 Ethernet adapter :

IP Address.......... : 192.168.1.4
Subnet Mask....... : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway...: 192.168.1.1

1 Ethernet adapter :

IP Address.......... : 0.0.0.0
Subnet Mask....... : 0.0.0.0
Default Gateway...:

c:/windows>
 
Ah, you have two Ethernet adaptors. What I suspect is that you have both a wireless card and a regular network card, correct? In that case the problem you're running into is probably that the computer is trying to contact the router via the network card which obviously isn't going to work. If that's the case (and assuming that it's a PCI card and not an on-board card) then your simplest way around this is to uninstall the drivers, remove the card from the Device Manager, turn the computer off, remove the physical card from the computer and reboot. When you do so you should find that the wireless card is now assigned as adaptor 0 when the above ideas should work. If the network card is on-board however there should be a motherboard jumper setting and/or a BIOS setting to disable it. There are other ways around this but as you're unlikely to need two network adaptors in that computer this method is the simplest. Give that a try and let me know how it goes.
 
Couldn't physically find another network card so disabled the dial up adapter from the Device Manager but this only gave us an IP error message, so enabled it again. After some fiddling ipconfig still shows 2 ethernet adapters but both with zeros as IP address etc this time. :-(
 
Bummer, now it's getting complicated. OK, go back into "Start -> Control Panel -> Network Connections -> right-click on the Local Area Connection icon and choose properties" and this time check if there are two entries for "Internet Protocol (TCP/IP)", one bound to the wireless card and one to whatever the hell else is getting in the way. If not then maybe you will need to enable TCP/IP for the wireless card. Select that device from the list and choose properties and see what you get there.

The other thing that worked for me once when I was in a similiar situation was to uninstall ALL the network adaptor drivers, TCP/IP drivers, etc and re-install them. Try that, assign static IP addresses to the cards and see if that gets anywhere.
 
Got it !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It now works !!!!!!!!!!!

We deleted all the network adaptors from the hardware device manager
rebooted PC
Took out the new network card
Rebooted
Put the new Network card in
Rebooted

PC started and could see the network and access the internet

Thanks to "ThePenguinCometh" for his help
Cheers
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top