network bridge causing grief or is it?

[Rob Beattie]

I would be very grateful if someone could help me out with the
following problem.
My main WinXP desktop is attached to a wireless Belkin router which
was itself attached to a terayon cable modem(for ntl broadband
internet). I have 2 other computers linked wirelessly to the router.
My problem began when I read something about network bridges and how
unneccessary they were for a network configuration like mine. I
decided that I would disable it and see what happens as i could easily
enough re-enable later. Well after I disabled I noticed that I had
lost the link to the router so I immediately activated it again. To my
dismay I discovered that I could not gain access to the net again
therefore I decided to reboot the router and the modem. This did not
work as the modem was not able to connect to the Internet even though
the WAN link was good.
Feeling very worried I connected the modem directly to the PC and saw
that there was still no internet connection so I began to get
desperate and started to enable/disable everything in sight.
Eventually I hit upon a non satisfactory solution by disabling and
reenabling the network bridge and rebooting the modem I could at least
get the internet connection back when the modem was connected to the
PC directly. So this leaves me unable to get the router to connect to
the internet and having to go through the temporary fix each time I
boot up my PC. How could this happen as it was all working very well
before I decided to disable the network bridge initially?
So does anyone have a clue? Do I need a network bridge for my
situation of connecting the 3 pcs to the router for internet access
and why when I re-enabled the bridge does it not work when it
previously did?
This has got to be a toughie.
Oh and here are the 3 items in my 'Network Connections' area


1394 Connection
Network Bridge (Network Bridge) 2
Local Area Connection

 

[CWatters]

1394 Connection
Network Bridge (Network Bridge) 2
Local Area Connection

I've got two PC on a wired LAN into a D-Link router and cable modem. Under
Internet Connections I have...

Internet gateway
Internet Connection Enabled Internet Connection

LAN or High-Speen Internet
1394 Connection Enabled 1394 Net Adapter
Local Area Connection Enabled Asound 10/100M Based Fast Ethernet
Card

When I set my PC up I used the wizard and selected the option "This PC
connects to the Internet via a hub" (or something like that). You get a
warning that a hub isn't secure but I think you can ignore that because the
D-Link I'm using is a Router not a hub and Routers contain a firewall.

 

[Butterfield]

So does anyone have a clue? Do I need a network bridge for my
situation of connecting the 3 pcs to the router for internet access
and why when I re-enabled the bridge does it not work when it
previously did?
This has got to be a toughie.

Try to keep your panic level below raging! Go into your Device Manager
and remove any network adapters. All connections and bridges in your
Network Connections control panel will go away. Select "Action" then
Scan for Hardware Changes in the Device manager. A wizard should start
when it finds your NIC. Select the appropriate connection options.
Don't use a bridge. Report back.


-- Butterfield

 

[Rob Beattie]

Try to keep your panic level below raging! Go into your Device Manager
and remove any network adapters. All connections and bridges in your
Network Connections control panel will go away. Select "Action" then
Scan for Hardware Changes in the Device manager. A wizard should start
when it finds your NIC. Select the appropriate connection options.
Don't use a bridge. Report back.


-- Butterfield

Hi Butterfield(and Cwatters),
It's all back working again now .

What I did was to play about with a whole host of settings and then
suddenly it the router detected the internet and the pc connected to
the router and I even have the wireless connectivity back again.
The last setting I changed was to remove the LAN from the network
bridge(which I also disabled) and although it did not work
immediately, it did when I came back a couple of hours later. I know
that the bridge is not needed but up until a few days ago there were
no problems with connectivity to the router or the internet when the
LAN was bridged to it. I never created the bridge and have no idea how
it got there but am very pleased that it has now been deactivated. In
fact I although I left the 1394 firewire connection attached to it, I
found that the next time I booted up, the NB had been removed
altogether so I did not even have to delete it. I soppose I should be
worried why this has happened but I still have the 1394 and LAN
connections enabled so I'm not too fussed.
Thanks for responding guys.