No network in college

[familyjez]

Hi-
I've been trying to fix my daughter's computer. Here at home she was
on our network through a D-Link wireless USB adapter. Everything
worked fine. She's in college now & left the wireless adapter here as
it won't work there & has a direct connect from the built in card (on
back of the computer, the ethernet card also has 2 usb slots). So, the
wire goes directly into the wall & the other end into the computer. It
lights green & amber when plugged into the computer, yet she is unable
to get online. Using the same cable & outlet on another computer
things work fine, so it's her computer. It just gives the "network
cable unplugged" message with the red X over it.

I think maybe the network information I installed for her at home is
conflicting at school. She doesn't have to have a password. It's just
directly plugged in & the internet comes through on a working
computer.

I've searched the groups but can't figure this one out. Also, in
Device Manager, I can see the intel ethernet adapter & it has no
errors, though is does say it's #3. There is a yellow exclamation on
ATM Controller, but I don't know what that is. The driver that came
with the computer has nothing for it. It's a vpr Matrix computer that
was bought used & runs Windows XP. We retored it from the restore
disks when we first got it & all worked fine, but have never used the
ethernet slot.

Any suggestions? Thanks for taking the time to read this. I
appreciate your input.

 

[Ben Cottrell]

Hi-
I've been trying to fix my daughter's computer. Here at home she was
on our network through a D-Link wireless USB adapter. Everything
worked fine. She's in college now & left the wireless adapter here as
it won't work there & has a direct connect from the built in card (on
back of the computer, the ethernet card also has 2 usb slots). So, the
wire goes directly into the wall & the other end into the computer. It
lights green & amber when plugged into the computer, yet she is unable
to get online. Using the same cable & outlet on another computer
things work fine, so it's her computer. It just gives the "network
cable unplugged" message with the red X over it.

I think maybe the network information I installed for her at home is
conflicting at school. She doesn't have to have a password. It's just
directly plugged in & the internet comes through on a working
computer.

What exactly did you put on her computer? Have you un-installed the
wireless USB adaptor and all the other stuff related to your wireless
network?

I've searched the groups but can't figure this one out. Also, in
Device Manager, I can see the intel ethernet adapter & it has no
errors, though is does say it's #3. There is a yellow exclamation on
ATM Controller, but I don't know what that is.

Is it definitely an intel ethernet adaptor? or is that just what windows
thinks it is? (If windows doesn't have the right drivers for it, then
it will just provide something which it does have the drivers for -
often these drivers will not work)

What happened to #2 and #1? If you had multiple devices listed for the
same network card and removed the ones which had the yellow (!), whilst
leaving the one that didn't have this, then you removed the wrong one.

If this is the case, remove #3 aswell and reboot - let windows find the
device and install drivers for it it. If you get multiple copies
again, then you *must* remove the one that has no conflicts.
- the one that has no conflicts is really a "ghost". Windows will tell
you that it is working properly, when in fact it's not working at all.

The one that would otherwise be working properly has a conflict because
it can see the ghost.

I'm not sure what ATM controller is - Is this listed under Network
devices or somewhere else?

The driver that came
with the computer has nothing for it. It's a vpr Matrix computer that
was bought used & runs Windows XP. We retored it from the restore
disks when we first got it & all worked fine, but have never used the
ethernet slot.

You may be lucky and have a network adaptor that windows already has
working drivers for... Try doing the uninstall/reinstall as i've
mentioned above and you'll find out.

if you don't, then you should find out what the exact model number is
(open up the case and look at the card.. or, if it's an on-board
ethernet adaptor then look at the model number for the motherboard and
download network drivers from the motherboard manufacturer's site).


Also, you mentioned about the driver disk --
Sometimes you will be using "Update this device" and telling windows
where to look for drivers, but windows will not find anything because it
thinks you're trying to update to something completely different to the
drivers that windows has already wrongly installed for you.

The way around this rather annoying little problem is to use "Add new
hardware" wizard in control panel, and manually add the drivers from
disk as if it were a completely new, uncategorised device.

If I remember correctly, Windows breaks it's New hardware wizard down
into device categories before it gives you the option to have a disk.
one of these categories is 'network devices' - Do *Not* choose this
option! .. Make sure that when adding new hardware manually with the
wizard that you select "other devices".

Doing it this way is Making sure windows doesn't think you're updating
network card drivers (Even though you really are, you don't want windows
to make any assumptions for you!). The reason for this is that windows
may deliberately hide the correct drivers and tell you "the specified
location does not contain information about your hardware".

The reason why it does this is beyond me, I believe it may be
something to do with the way the .INF files are written.

Using the workaround above, you should be able to get a complete listing
of all the drivers that are on your driver disk that you may not have
been able to see before.

Good luck!

--
Ben Cottrell AKA Bench

Disclaimer:
This post may contain explicit depictions of things which are "real".
These "real" things are commonly known as 'life'! So, if it sounds
sarcastic, don't take it seriously. If it sounds hazardous, Do not try
this at home or at all. And if it offends you, just don't read it.

 

[SEC]

Hi,

Been there I found that my daughter's laptop had to be configured using
fairly detailed instructions for setting up the connection--instructions
found on the college's "resnet" or technical support department. You might
want to search her college's website for some similar FAQ regarding setup
for internet access. Good luck

SEC

 

[familyjez]

Thank you all for your suggestions. I'm going to try to get back up
there this weekend & see if I can figure it out, or I'll try to talk
her through some of it on the phone.

I'm not sure what happend to the 1 & 2 connections. I did uninstall
the existing network devices & the ATM controller & restart & it came
back on & named that one #3 & 1394 net adapter #4. I didn't uninstall
anything to do with the network I had set up for home or remove the
wireless device. I need to do those things & find the workaround so
that Windows will get the right driver for the device.

The college told us that you just plug into the wall & you're
connected, & it works that way on a laptop when plugged into the same
outlet, so it just has to be a device conflict on her desktop.

I appreciate your ideas & I'll give them a try when I can.