No Default Gateway address, any idea's?

[Danmoh]

Hey People wondering if anyone has any ideas of ow i can fix this problem, i have been given a laptop to try and fix which had the problem that it just couldn't connect to the internet!

So I've tried almost every avenue i know of and still cant seem to find out what the problem is. The laptop is an emachines e520 using vista home 32bit.

I've tried the following:

- Un-installed all network drivers/reinstalled all drivers, (including gettin latests drivers from emachines web site still no luck)
- DHCP is enabled
- I've ping'ed local host, 4 packets sent and 4 packets lost.
- Enabled/Disabled Firewalls
- Changed router wpa key to just numbers still no luck (i know there is no problem with the router or network st up as i have othermachines connected to it)
- Restored system to an earlier restore point.
- I have also tried a wireless usb dongle still no look
- if i connect the laptop straight through Ethernet to the router still no look.
- Malware bytes ran no luck her either

Windows is showing the wireless networks available and when entering the network key it just seems to not want to connect.

Ipconfig shows the following results:

Wireless Lan adapter wireless network connection:

Connection-specific Dns Suffix:
Description: Broadcon 802.11g Network Adapter
Physical Address: 00-23-4d-d1-cb-1b
DHCP Enabled: Yes
Autoconfig Enabled:
IPV6: fe80::30f0:a87d:fe97:3769%14 <preferred>
IPV4: 196.254.55.105<preferred>
Subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
Default gateway:
DNS Servers: fec0:0:0:ffff::1%1
fec0:0:0:ffff::2%1
fec0:0:0:ffff::3%1

NetBIOS over TCP/IP: Enabled

(key issue is the default gateway missing)

I not sure if the above information helps, but does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

[Splash]

You absolutely sure about that ip address? I suspect that the first part is 169, not 196. That'd make it an APIPA, and would explain your lack of success thus far.

Is there any form of MAC filtering on the router/WAP that you're trying to connect to?

[Danmoh]

Really sorry ye it is a 169 not 196 (miss type) and there is no mac filtering on the router.

Any idea?

Thanks

Daniel

[Splash]

Essentially the NIC isn't getting an ip address from the DHCP server, which in most cases is built into the router. Is this on your router (ie the one you're surfing the internet on to post here) or a different one? If you have a known working DHCP server and internet connection, and it's failing even on a cabled connection (and a second wireless connection) I'd be looking to reinstall TCP/IP.

Can you manually set an ip address up in the DHCP scope and assign the relevant settings to the NIC? If you do, does it work? Do you see any errors in device manager? What firewall software is it running?

It's a lot of questions to throw at you, but there's still rather a lot that could be going wrong.

[Danmoh]

Yes the router is the same router im using to post on here basically the router is plugged directly into this computer, then i just unplug the Ethernet cable and plug it back into the laptop to the the fault testing.

Now i plugged the Ethernet cable directly into the laptop and did the restore/reinstall of tcp ip (netsh int ip reset) (is this the correct way to)

I then plugged the cable back into this system (the one being used to post on here), and did an ip config, i got the follwoing results:

Ipv4 - 192.168.0.8
Subnet - 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway - 192.168.0.1
Dns - 192.168.0.1

So i used these details to manually assign an IP on the laptop (again connected through a wired connection directly to the router)

Still no joy!

The firewall i am using is the standard windows firewall, And there are no errors in device manager.

However i did boot of a ubuntu 10 pen drive and it got a connect to the internet this way via onboard LAN.

????

[oolon]

Dumb questions can you see the SID for your wireless broadcast on the wi-fi network selection? Does windows show that you have connected to it?

[Danmoh]

Yep i can see the available connections and it shows an excellent signal strenght, however in the properties the activity shows 0 packets sent and 0 packets recieved.

[oolon]

Yep i can see the available connections and it shows an excellent signal strenght, however in the properties the activity shows 0 packets sent and 0 packets recieved.

Click on it to connect to it then.... no packets means your not connected. even if its not being received, you still send some out if you were connected.

[Danmoh]

When i try to connect using the wpa2 key, its comes up with a unable to connect.

Sorry if i miss-understood you before mate.

[oolon]

Right then that is your problem, you need to know why your WPA2 key is not working. Does your Wifi access point/router support WPA2? Are you is A, B, G or N wi-fi network, what does your router support, and your computer? Does your computer support WPA2? What encryption is it using DES or AES? How old is the router how old is your computer? If its an ISP router, reset it and use the default password on the side of the box.

[Danmoh]

I have booted from a ubuntu pen drive and been able to access internet through wireless and wired connection. So im quite sure there is no problem with compatibility between the router and the laptop.

The router is running fine, I have tried other laptops/systems and connected them to it with ease.

I have also plugged the laptop in a different router, which is running on a complete different network (no way connected to network i am currently using) and still have no luck.


Im really thinking that there is something wrong within the windows configuration, but dont know what.

Colleagues are telling me to do a factory restore on the laptop, but before i do this i want make sure i have tried absolutely everything (bit of a learning process for me as my next job is a network related job).

[oolon]

Check the firewall, I had some Bozo con my aunt into looking at her computer and he screwed up the firewall (ZoneAlarm), this resulted in no network connectivity, and your ubuntu test proves the hardware works. So this is where I would look, also do you have any VPN software on the computer? Those can cause problems.

[Danmoh]

Is there a way of listing all the know firewalls installed on the computer?

or is there anyway of listing all the programs which trying to use the internet which could be causing the conflict.

I've tried msconfig and disabled all that i think are not needed but not 100%

it is currently using the windows firewall but i have noticed that there are a lot of other internet based programs which could be causing conflicts (basically the computers a friends and she must of download loads of internet based clients or something)

oh i also tried booting the laptop into windows safe mode with networking again No Luck :-(

is the last option really to nuke it and start fresh?

[oolon]

Get the data off the machine and nuke it from orbit its the only way to be sure. Virii and Trogens can also cause the firewall to disable all (the guy was trying to install a nasty in my Aunts case and it shut all the networking down.. and prevented him from completing it... good thing). Atleast with a restore you can be sure how long it will take to complete if you can poke around at problems for days, in which time you could have rebuilt it.

[Danmoh]

Cheers for your help,

the boys getting nuked!!!

cheers

[scaryjim]

Before you nuke it, check your service packs. Don't know if this applies to Vista or not, but I've had three computers now on XP which wouldn't connect to a WPA2 AP until I upgraded from SP2 to SP3 - there was clearly something broken with MS's zero config and WPA2 prior to that. If your Vista install is pre-SP1 perhaps it's an issue that carried over? XP SP3 was published ~ 18 months after Vista was released...

Shouldn't take too long to install the latest Vista service pack just to be sure (although I guess you'll need to download it on another machine ).