Lose connection to Internet after several hours of inactivity

M

Michael

I have a new Compaq Presario M2105US with XP sp2.

My network includes 2 iBooks with airport cards, the Compaq Presario and a
Desktop Mac with enthernet connection to my Linksys WRT54G v.3 wireless
router. I've got TimeWarner broadband.

I can easily connect to the Internet through the Linksys router with all
computers. However the Compaq will eventually lose the connection to the
Internet (though not to the router) after several hours of inactivity. But
only after several hours (perhaps 4 hours or more, but not less than 3
hours). If I use the computer in the evening for example and take several
breaks, everytime I come back to the computer and wake it from sleep, it
will quickly re-establish the Internet connection. However if the computer
is sleeping for hours, like overnight, and I wake it up, it appears to
re-establish contact with the router because the network conneciton reports
a connection with very good signal strength. But I can't access the
Internet. Only by logging off and on again or by restarting can I regain
internet connectivity.

I've enabled DHCP and assigned a Static IP address to the Compaq with no
change in behavior. I've also ensured the Broadcom WLAN has energy saving
disabled.

This is crazy. Compaq Tech Support told me that this is normal behavior for
Windows XP. I can't believe that. Is that true? My Macs can sleep for days
on end and instantly reconnect to the Internet through the router, but not
the Compaq.

Any ideas?

Michael
 
M

Michael

I'm cautiously optimistic that my problem has been solved.

I read that there was a problem with the Broadcom NIC that caused this
problem for many people and that there was driver update which I obtained
and installed. This seems to have fixed the problem for me. Yeah!

I went to my Wireless Network Configuration, where it says "Connect using"
is where it indiates the Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN. I clicked on the configure
button and then in the properties window, clicked on Update Driver. Voila.
Fixed. I hope.

Michael
 

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