Vista Intermittent Network Connection Problems

[Guest]

I am have an intermittent network problem with Vista Home Premium on an ACER
laptop. Upon bootup the network connection appears fine. The browser will
make a good connection anywhere the first time. But sometimes after the first
connection the browser cannot connect anywhere.At this point no windows
application can connect anywhere on the WEB including windows mail.
The Windows Network Diagnostics provides the message: "There may be a
problem withyour Domain Name Server (DNS) configuration. Windows failed to
find the well known host 'www.microsoft.com' using DNS. The server maybe be
down"
But, I can, in a DOS command window ping 'www.microsoft.com' and the IP
address is resolved with no difficulty (although that host does not respond
to Ping).
It does not matter which browser I use either IE Ethernet Explorer or
Mozilla FireFox, the symptoms are the same. I have attempted turning off the
firewall and pop-up blockers to no avail.
I took the computer back to the store service departpartment (Best But &
Geek Squad); they ran diagnostics that verified that there were no hardware
problems and that problems were in Windows.
What can I do to fix this problem?

 

[Robert Miles]

I have seen the exact same behavior. An intermittent inability to
establish any new connections to things on the Internet... mail servers,
web server, chat services, etc. Any connections already established are
fine however. I can ping, and look up IP addresses, but that's it.
Additionally, I have a friend who also has Vista and see the same
intermittent behavior.

Basically, I just have to wait until Vista "comes back", to continue
those activities or simply reboot. This really smells like a bug in
Windows to me... but have no idea how to solve it, or if there is a
solution for it.

GMac

Can you ping addresses that are a name instead of four numbers?
If not, it could be problems reaching your ISP's DNS server.

 

[david]

Yes, I can ping names (i.e. Yahoo.com) just fine. If I try to ping
something that doesn't respond to pings, such as microsoft.com, it still
shows me the IP address for Microsoft.com. For that reason, I really
believe it's not a DNS issue.

I'll be browsing happily along and then suddenly get the good old
"Server is not available" message (or some such) and then I can no
longer browse or establish new connections to anynetwork(even
internal) resources. My connections to instant messenger services are
all intact and usable. If I disconnect from any service, I am unable to
reconnect. Same goes for any remote desktop sessions I've established
(like from work to home). As long as I stay connected I'm fine. So
sometimes, I'll actually use my home computer to continue doing any
Google searches I'm doing until myVistabox's networking comes back,
which it seems to do within about a half an hour.

It's a rather irritating problem, and clearly not isolated to my
installation.

Same problem on an Acer. My wireless connection works fine, but my
wired is erratic. After 2 hours with MS help I installed a new driver
for the ethernet card and the connection was fine for about a day.
Very fustrating that my old XP machine is so much more reliable.

 

[Warren]

As far as I know no one has offered a solution since I first posted in Sept.
'07. But I have wondered about the commercials running on Comcast Cable
advising To power down and then power back up. What's that all about?

Warren

 

[Randem]

If you have Vista, it is most likely you have Norton Anti-Virus. Norton is
known to terminate traffic on your system although you can Ping your can't
send or receive port 80 traffic. Check to see if your trial subscription has
terminated, if it has then you should uninstall Norton (completely using the
unistall tool also) and your connection will mysteriously re-appear...

This is one possibly solution to your issues.

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Randem Systems
Your Installation Specialist
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http://www.randem.com/innoscript.html
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http://www.randem.com/discus/messages/9402/9406.html?1236319938

 

[+Bob+]

If you have Vista, it is most likely you have Norton Anti-Virus. Norton is
known to terminate traffic on your system although you can Ping your can't
send or receive port 80 traffic. Check to see if your trial subscription has
terminated, if it has then you should uninstall Norton (completely using the
unistall tool also) and your connection will mysteriously re-appear...

This is one possibly solution to your issues.

ZOne Alarm also causes issues for some folks.

Have you upgraded to SP2? A friend of mine with the same scenario as
you found that SP2 mysteriously fixed it.