Big computer problem..

[BlindMelon]

Ok.. well yesterday we had a crazy lightning storm. I came home to
find that our living room computer’s monitor was all crazy. Its color
was not right, so my friend fixed it by just turning off the monitor
turning it back on. Then, I noticed our internet was down. I saw the
modem still had status (where it’s actually connected to the cable
company) up, but the PC connection was down. This was with all 3
computers (including the living room one). My brother found out that
his computer didn’t function. It turned on, but didn’t give him video.
His motherboard said FF (because he has the epox board and it tells
you the error), but I’m not sure if it helped him. He tried clearing
BIOS and that didn’t help, so today he’s going to go piece by piece
and see what doesn’t work, and what does.

Anyway, back to the internet problem. I was messing around with the
other two computers, and first thought it was the cat 5e cable that
was broken. So I tried clearing the BIOS’s to maybe refresh the
onboard lan (which both of them have and use[d]), and that did
nothing. So I remembered I had my friend’s old computer downstairs,
got his netgear card, put that in the living room computer, which made
the computer lag like every 3 seconds for about 5 seconds. I couldn’t
access the internet on that one, so I put it in my computer. My
computer started up and it worked (as you can see). Now, I thought
maybe because I still had the onboard lan enabled on the living room
computer that maybe that’s what was causing the lag and not being able
for me to get on the internet... well I turned out to be wrong. And
another thing I encountered... we use a router for the internet, and I
can only plug in the cat 5e cable into the 4th port for the internet,
the other ports do not light up (I figured maybe the other ports had
gotten fried or something). I even got out our old hub and it was the
same thing. Why is this? The old hub was perfect before we had stopped
using it.

Know how to fix any of these issues, then please post!

 

[kony]

Ok.. well yesterday we had a crazy lightning storm. I came home to
find that our living room computer’s monitor was all crazy. Its color
was not right, so my friend fixed it by just turning off the monitor
turning it back on. Then, I noticed our internet was down. I saw the
modem still had status (where it’s actually connected to the cable
company) up, but the PC connection was down. This was with all 3
computers (including the living room one). My brother found out that
his computer didn’t function. It turned on, but didn’t give him video.
His motherboard said FF (because he has the epox board and it tells
you the error), but I’m not sure if it helped him. He tried clearing
BIOS and that didn’t help, so today he’s going to go piece by piece
and see what doesn’t work, and what does.

FIrst of all, have you power cycled the modem and router
yet? If there are any other switches, they too may need
power cycled, and afterwards, the systems rebooted.

Anyway, back to the internet problem. I was messing around with the
other two computers, and first thought it was the cat 5e cable that
was broken. So I tried clearing the BIOS’s to maybe refresh the
onboard lan (which both of them have and use[d]), and that did
nothing. So I remembered I had my friend’s old computer downstairs,
got his netgear card, put that in the living room computer, which made
the computer lag like every 3 seconds for about 5 seconds.

That sounds a lot like a failed network connection.
"Assuming" that Netgear card was working previously, AND
that it wasn't hooked up to your lan during the
thunderstorm, consider that the "golden card", moving it (or
another known undamaged) card from PC to PC.

Essentially it may be that the surge has traveled through
your network and fried a few ports on the router as well as
the NICs... if not more, sometimes more subtle damage takes
longer to notice.

I couldn’t
access the internet on that one, so I put it in my computer. My
computer started up and it worked (as you can see). Now, I thought
maybe because I still had the onboard lan enabled on the living room
computer that maybe that’s what was causing the lag and not being able
for me to get on the internet... well I turned out to be wrong.

What exactly do you mean?
If you disabled the onboard lan, then reboot the system it's
lagging? Do you have links, toolbar icons, or shared
drives, etc, set up? If so, get rid of those (just put them
into a folder you won't be accessing for the time being).

And
another thing I encountered... we use a router for the internet, and I
can only plug in the cat 5e cable into the 4th port for the internet,
the other ports do not light up (I figured maybe the other ports had
gotten fried or something).

If you pull the plug from one port that was lit and it won't
light up the others, then yes - your router is then, at a
minimum, having serveral damaged ports- and maybe more
damage than that. You might try resetting it (usually a
recessed button you hold in, see the owner's manual), but
that would be more likely to fix logical problems, not the
ports (if they're fried).

I even got out our old hub and it was the
same thing. Why is this? The old hub was perfect before we had stopped
using it.

Same thing means you tried connecting that lone network
adapter known good, that was previously causing that one
router port to show the link status light?

I'm not clear on all the details here, but basically it
would see the surge spread across the lan and every router
port that's failed has a potentially-damaged PC at the other
end, especially that PC's network adapter. You'll just have
to try each PC one at a time with the port that works.

 

[kony]

Ok. Sorry, I thought I made it clear, but I did get the card from my
friend’s computer that I was working on (this was not plugged in). I
took the card and then was seeing if it would work in the computers.
Since my first post, I have gotten the living room computer to work
and my computer to work (internet-wise), but my brother’s computer (we
think) is fried.

What I’ve done:
Took my friend’s netgear card & put it in the living room computer
Got another network card and put it in my computer
Well it turned out the HUB (not the router with 3 ports blown) does
work, but not directly from the cable modem. Like, if I hook the
cable modem directly to the hub, I can’t get any internet access
because with a HUB you need more than 1 IP, correct?

Yes, either more than one IP issued from the ISP, or another
LAN, NAT or proxy as a go-between. Otherwise, only one
computer has WAN access, and depending on your ISP, it could
be only one whose NIC's MAC address is registered with the
ISP, unless you clone that to (some other device).

Anyway, I took
the router’s one port that worked, hooked a cat 5 cable into that
port, then took that and plugged it into a port on the HUB. Now I
have pretty much a router, and took our existing cat 5 lines of the
computers and just plugged them in. It works perfectly.

Yes that is a good make-shift solution- I didn't realize you
had the hub confirmed-working.

I also tried doing the reset button on the router, but that does
nothing. All the lights light up (including the ones that are
supposedly fried), but they do not work. My router is the D-Link
DI-604 and my HUB is the Netgear DS104. If anyone has a better
solution (other than buying a new router, which we will do sometime
down the road), then awesome, post it. Thanks!

Seems like you have a good assessment of the situation. If
the other router ports don't work after switching the cables
to those ports and power-cycling the router, there's nothing
more it's reasonable to do. Well, the Dlink page does
mention the router has "New Integrated Cable Diagnostic
Utility" which you could try, but I doubt it'll reveal
anything useful except that the connection doesn't work.

http://www.dlink.com/products/?model=DI-604

You could try reflashing it's firmware, but I doubt that
will matter either. You can get many different routers now
for about $20 after rebate, for example,
http://shop4.outpost.com/product/3635315 ,
though since one port still works, personally I would
consider getting a Gigabit switch instead, running that to
the router's one switch in place of the hub then your lan is
ready for Gigabit upgrade in the foture. Gigabit routers
are still pretty expensive AFAIK.

 

[BlindMelon]

Yes, either more than one IP issued from the ISP, or another
LAN, NAT or proxy as a go-between. Otherwise, only one
computer has WAN access, and depending on your ISP, it could
be only one whose NIC's MAC address is registered with the
ISP, unless you clone that to (some other device).



Yes that is a good make-shift solution- I didn't realize you
had the hub confirmed-working.



Seems like you have a good assessment of the situation. If
the other router ports don't work after switching the cables
to those ports and power-cycling the router, there's nothing
more it's reasonable to do. Well, the Dlink page does
mention the router has "New Integrated Cable Diagnostic
Utility" which you could try, but I doubt it'll reveal
anything useful except that the connection doesn't work.

http://www.dlink.com/products/?model=DI-604

You could try reflashing it's firmware, but I doubt that
will matter either. You can get many different routers now
for about $20 after rebate, for example,
http://shop4.outpost.com/product/3635315 ,
though since one port still works, personally I would
consider getting a Gigabit switch instead, running that to
the router's one switch in place of the hub then your lan is
ready for Gigabit upgrade in the foture. Gigabit routers
are still pretty expensive AFAIK.

Awesome, I am going to start checking into new routers. Thanks a lot
for the advice and help.