Can't access web sites over internet.

[Spence]

A colleague has Vista Home (not certain which version) and can't access any web sites. She
has AOL as her ISP. I took my laptop running Vista Business down to her place to check,
and that connects OK. She also has a desktop running XP Home and that works OK. From her
laptop I can ping the router, and following is the result:

C:\Users\shirley>ping 192.168.1.254

Pinging 192.168.1.254 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 192.168.1.254: bytes=32 time=4ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.254: bytes=32 time=2ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.254: bytes=32 time=2ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.254: bytes=32 time=2ms TTL=64

Ping statistics for 192.168.1.254:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 2ms, Maximum = 4ms, Average = 2ms

C:\Users\shirley>

I also did an IPConfig on both her laptop and mine, and the wireless connection seems
pretty much the same for both. Below is my laptop:

C:\Users\Administrator>ipconfig /all

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : A100-049-Vista
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : lan

Wireless LAN adapter Wireless Network Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : lan
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connection
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-19-D2-1A-FA-D0
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . . : fe80::b1f4:83db:7be9:a91f%9(Preferred)
IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.69(Preferred)
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : Thursday, 21 February 2008 16:30:40
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Friday, 22 February 2008 16:30:40
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.254
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.254
DHCPv6 IAID . . . . . . . . . . . : 151001554
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.254
NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Enabled

And from her laptop:

C:\Users\shirley>ipconfig /all

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : shirley-PC
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : lan

Wireless LAN adapter Wireless Network Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : lan
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-1A-73-D1-AA-81
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . . : fe80::d5cb:c429:c90a:90c7%11(Preferred)
IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.68(Preferred)
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : 21 February 2008 16:17:22
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : 22 February 2008 16:17:21
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.254
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.254
DHCPv6 IAID . . . . . . . . . . . : 184556147
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.254
NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Enabled

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected
Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : home
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Realtek RTL8139/810x Family Fast Ethernet NIC
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-1B-38-B7-7F-88
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes

When we try to access a web site, we get a screen saying:

Internet Explorer cannot display the web page

Most likely causes
You are not connected to the internet
The website is encountering problems
There might be a typing error in the address

What you can try:
Diagnose connection Problems
More information

When we select Diagnose connection problems, the following appears:

You are already connected to the internet
Browse the internet now
Set up a new connection anyway

Selecting Browse the internet now takes us back to the previous step.

Anybody have any ideas please?

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

Open an elevated command prompt by right clicking the link and choosing "run
as administrator". From there, flush the dns cache while IE is closed:

ipconfig /release
ipconfig /flushdns
ipconfig /renew

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[Spence]

Open an elevated command prompt by right clicking the link and choosing "run
as administrator". From there, flush the dns cache while IE is closed:

ipconfig /release
ipconfig /flushdns
ipconfig /renew

Many thanks for that Rick. I'll try it tomorrow.

 

[Spence]

Open an elevated command prompt by right clicking the link and choosing "run
as administrator". From there, flush the dns cache while IE is closed:

ipconfig /release
ipconfig /flushdns
ipconfig /renew

Finally managed to get hold of the PC again, and that didn't work.

Tried a few things to narrow down the problem, by comparing my laptop, which
works, and her's which doesn't.

On both machines I can ping www.microsoft.com. Doesn't return any packets, but
it does on both PCs return the IP address. If I then type that IP address into
the browser address bar, I get MS's site come up on my PC, but the same error
message on her's. My impression from that is that it's not a DNS problem.

I've set the IE Options to be the same on both PCs as far as possible, in
particular the Security, Privacy, Connections and Advanced tabs.

As a clutching at straws method, I've just loaded Filezilla on her machine and
tried to connect to my web site. It finds the IP address from the ftp address,
but can't connect.

Is there anything else you can suggest.

Thanks

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

Is there a firewall on the system other than the native one?

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[Spence]

Hi,

Is there a firewall on the system other than the native one?

According to the Windows Security Center There's just the Windows
Firewall, although there is a warning that Two or more can conflict
with each other.

She does have Norton Internet Security installed, but the Security
Center just reports that in Malware Protection (and reporting that it's
out of date).

I can't see here how to turn off Norton Internet Security. I've tried
running it from the desktop and nothing happens. Also been into the
Norton Internet Security folder and tried running all the application
files there (isPwdSvc, isUAC, nisoptui and osCheck) all to no avail.
Even nisoptui (which I'm guessing is an abbreviation for Norton
Internet Security Options User Interface) displays no window. Going
into Task Manager, under Processes and Services tabs, only seems to
indicate that the isPwdSvc is actually running.

It's already been back to the store, but they say there's nothing
wrong, but they don't have an internet connection and can't test that.

I'm beginning to think it may be going back again.

Thanks for you suggestions.

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi Spence,

Before you bring it back, just try uninstalling the Norton software
altogether. I suspect you may find it to be the cause.

You may need to rebuild the tcp stack after removal. Open an elevated
command prompt (same steps as before), run:

netsh winsock reset

Then reboot.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[Spence]

Before you bring it back, just try uninstalling the Norton software
altogether. I suspect you may find it to be the cause.

Ha! Nice idea, but... Can't recall the exact message, but uninspiring
from Control Panel gave an error "Can't find the module requested" (or
something similar).

And the Norton folder doesn't have an uninstall program in it.

Why do people use Norton? (Rhetorical Question)

 

[Bob F.]

Ha! Nice idea, but... Can't recall the exact message, but uninspiring
from Control Panel gave an error "Can't find the module requested" (or
something similar).

And the Norton folder doesn't have an uninstall program in it.

Why do people use Norton? (Rhetorical Question)

Rhetorical answer...because they don't know any better. Try this:
http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039
Find the Norton program you want to get rid of.

--
BobF.
Lincoln actually got it right but was way ahead of his time when he said,
"You can have some of you computer working all of the time and all of your
computer working some of the time but..." It was he that said that, wasn't
it?

 

[LesleyO]

Ha! Nice idea, but... Can't recall the exact message, but uninspiring
from Control Panel gave an error "Can't find the module requested" (or
something similar).

And the Norton folder doesn't have an uninstall program in it.

Why do people use Norton? (Rhetorical Question)

You ask why people use Norton, and a lot of things seem to be blamed on it.
Well, I've been using Norton literally for years, both on my XP desktop and
now on Vista, and have never had a problem at all. I'm still running both
machines (in fact three, as my husband has an XP laptop) with up-to-date and
current Norton, without problems, on a wireless ADSL network at home. All
three access (and download) online just fine.

There are times when it makes sense to turn off auto-protect until a
download is completed, but that's just knowing the program. And while I've
been using computers of one sort or another since about 1983, I'm certainly
not a "techie."

Whatever the initial problem was, I doubt that Norton was the actual cause.

 

[Spence]

but uninspiring from

That should have read uninstalling.

 

[Spence]

Thanks everyone for your inputs on this. As it was a new PC, and had no
data on it, user went for a total re-install of Windows.