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losing internet on one computer
Using WinXP on two computers on a wireless network in my home. In the
last few days, I've been losing my internet connection on one of the two computers, and it's happening more and more frequently. Sometimes the icon itself disappears, sometimes not. The only way to get the connection back (I think) is to reboot. The other computer is working fine, as is my iPad. Any idea of why this is happening and what I can do about it? Thank you, Jo-Anne |
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losing internet on one computer
On 12/29/2014 07:57 PM, Jo-Anne wrote:
Using WinXP on two computers on a wireless network in my home. In the last few days, I've been losing my internet connection on one of the two computers, and it's happening more and more frequently. Sometimes the icon itself disappears, sometimes not. The only way to get the connection back (I think) is to reboot. The other computer is working fine, as is my iPad. Any idea of why this is happening and what I can do about it? Thank you, Jo-Anne Is the one that loses the connection farther away from the wireless router? It could be the orientation of the antenna. |
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losing internet on one computer
On 12/30/2014 9:14 AM, philo wrote:
On 12/29/2014 07:57 PM, Jo-Anne wrote: Using WinXP on two computers on a wireless network in my home. In the last few days, I've been losing my internet connection on one of the two computers, and it's happening more and more frequently. Sometimes the icon itself disappears, sometimes not. The only way to get the connection back (I think) is to reboot. The other computer is working fine, as is my iPad. Any idea of why this is happening and what I can do about it? Thank you, Jo-Anne Is the one that loses the connection farther away from the wireless router? It could be the orientation of the antenna. It's in the same place that it's been for three years--and it's just a few feet away from the router. The computer that's working fine is probably 30 or 40 feet from the router. Jo-Anne |
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losing internet on one computer
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losing internet on one computer
Jo-Anne wrote:
On 12/30/2014 10:26 AM, wrote: On Tue, 30 Dec 2014 09:48:47 -0600, Jo-Anne wrote: On 12/30/2014 9:14 AM, philo wrote: On 12/29/2014 07:57 PM, Jo-Anne wrote: Using WinXP on two computers on a wireless network in my home. In the last few days, I've been losing my internet connection on one of the two computers, and it's happening more and more frequently. Sometimes the icon itself disappears, sometimes not. The only way to get the connection back (I think) is to reboot. The other computer is working fine, as is my iPad. Any idea of why this is happening and what I can do about it? Thank you, Jo-Anne Is the one that loses the connection farther away from the wireless router? It could be the orientation of the antenna. It's in the same place that it's been for three years--and it's just a few feet away from the router. The computer that's working fine is probably 30 or 40 feet from the router. Jo-Anne Is the router light for that cable on? Unplug, count to 10 and replug the cable Did that fix it? You didn't say what you are running but in XP hit start/settings/network connections and look at your network (LAN). Is it connected? Right click on it and click repair Did that complete? try the internet again. This can be a bad network card. I've been wondering if there's a network card that could be going bad. I've been using this WinXP computer in this spot near the router for three years, with only a wifi connection, no cable. Until this past week, it was working fine. Then the internet connection was lost occasionally--and in the last day much more frequently. It's been working OK since last night, but the internet connection disappeared several times during the day yesterday and the computer had to be rebooted to get it back. When it happens again, I'll check the network connections. Thank you. Jo-Anne I have an idea. It's Christmas time. Perhaps you received a new electronics item of some sort ? Something which either emits in the 2.4GHz band, or something which is actually a Wifi device. Perhaps a new microwave oven (with leaky door), a cordless phone for old fashioned copper telephony, some other kind of wireless device. Another possibility, is you got a new appliance with metal body, added to the premises, and it is reflecting the Wifi signal. It's probably not interference from a neighbor running a high power router, because all your Wifi could be affected in that case. ******* Some of the single chip Wifi solutions, they "burn out" and the radio portion of the chip is no longer able to produce full output. But that usually happens in a period less than three years. If it's been OK for three years, chances are the problem is elsewhere. A "good" Wifi design uses several chips inside a metal can, with each chip type being selected to do the best job for the function. When everything is jammed into one chip, they try to do a radio circuit at 2.4GHz or 5GHz, in CMOS logic gate transistors. One of the symptoms can be, that people who review the Wifi product, some say it sucks and some say it is OK implying a wide range of RF signal levels out of the box (they're shipping even the units with weak output). And then these go downhill in another three to six months of usage. If you have a USB3 card added to an older computer, or just purchased a USB3 peripheral for a new computer (one with built-in USB3), note that an Intel study shows the actual USB3 cable and peripheral can put out RF noise. It is sufficient to stop a Bluetooth wireless keyboard dongle from working properly. Part of the testing for that is to re-route the cable and re-locate the peripheral, away from the RF antenna on any other devices. Or stop using USB3 entirely, and plug into a USB2 port instead. You might suspect Intels motivation for releasing such a report, but we can hope that it leads to better designed USB3 disk enclosures. Ones with shielding. Paul |
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losing internet on one computer
On 12/30/2014 09:48 AM, Jo-Anne wrote:
snip Is the one that loses the connection farther away from the wireless router? It could be the orientation of the antenna. It's in the same place that it's been for three years--and it's just a few feet away from the router. The computer that's working fine is probably 30 or 40 feet from the router. Jo-Anne Since it's just a few feet from the router, I would not even bother to use WIFI...I'd just plug it in using a CAT-5 cable and be done with it. |
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losing internet on one computer
On Tue, 30 Dec 2014 12:49:33 -0600, philo* wrote:
On 12/30/2014 09:48 AM, Jo-Anne wrote: snip Is the one that loses the connection farther away from the wireless router? It could be the orientation of the antenna. It's in the same place that it's been for three years--and it's just a few feet away from the router. The computer that's working fine is probably 30 or 40 feet from the router. Jo-Anne Since it's just a few feet from the router, I would not even bother to use WIFI...I'd just plug it in using a CAT-5 cable and be done with it. Isn't that going to be faster too? I made one mediocre comparison between a cable and a USB wifi receiver and it didn't run as fast on wifi, though maybe the USB receiver was failing or overheating. |
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losing internet on one computer
On 12/30/2014 03:29 PM, micky wrote:
Since it's just a few feet from the router, I would not even bother to use WIFI...I'd just plug it in using a CAT-5 cable and be done with it. Isn't that going to be faster too? I made one mediocre comparison between a cable and a USB wifi receiver and it didn't run as fast on wifi, though maybe the USB receiver was failing or overheating. It will not necessarily be faster but any machine I can connect directly to my router...I do. Don't really use the wireless for anything but the laptop. |
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losing internet on one computer
On Tuesday, December 30, 2014 4:08:00 PM UTC-6, philo* wrote:
On 12/30/2014 03:29 PM, micky wrote: Since it's just a few feet from the router, I would not even bother to use WIFI...I'd just plug it in using a CAT-5 cable and be done with it.. Isn't that going to be faster too? I made one mediocre comparison between a cable and a USB wifi receiver and it didn't run as fast on wifi, though maybe the USB receiver was failing or overheating. It will not necessarily be faster but any machine I can connect directly to my router...I do. Don't really use the wireless for anything but the laptop. I agree with the recommendation to use a ethernet cable and bypass wifi. In my experience the speed is a little faster. Andy |
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losing internet on one computer
In message , Paul
writes: Jo-Anne wrote: [] On Tue, 30 Dec 2014 09:48:47 -0600, Jo-Anne wrote: On 12/30/2014 9:14 AM, philo wrote: On 12/29/2014 07:57 PM, Jo-Anne wrote: Using WinXP on two computers on a wireless network in my home. In the last few days, I've been losing my internet connection on one of the two computers, and it's happening more and more frequently. Sometimes the icon itself disappears, sometimes not. The only way to get the connection back (I think) is to reboot. What is this icon that is disappearing? I presume one in the system tray. The other computer is working fine, as is my iPad. Any idea of why this is happening and what I can do about it? Thank you, Jo-Anne Is the one that loses the connection farther away from the wireless router? It could be the orientation of the antenna. It's in the same place that it's been for three years--and it's just a few feet away from the router. The computer that's working fine is probably 30 or 40 feet from the router. Jo-Anne [] I've been wondering if there's a network card that could be going bad. I've been using this WinXP computer in this spot near the router for three years, with only a wifi connection, no cable. Until this past week, it was working fine. Then the internet connection was lost occasionally--and in the last day much more frequently. It's been working OK since last night, but the internet connection disappeared several times during the day yesterday and the computer had to be rebooted to get it back. When it happens again, I'll check the network connections. Thank you. Jo-Anne I have an idea. It's Christmas time. Perhaps you received a new electronics item of some sort ? Something which either emits in the 2.4GHz band, or something which is actually a Wifi device. Perhaps a new microwave oven (with leaky door), a cordless phone for old fashioned copper telephony, some other kind of wireless device. Another possibility, is you got a new appliance with metal body, added to the premises, and it is reflecting the Wifi signal. It's probably not interference from a neighbor running a high power router, because all your Wifi could be affected in that case. That was _my_ first thought, but you're right, it would probably have affected the rest of the wifi. Still, new neighbour's router (or security camera, or ...) _could_ be positioned in such a way to just affect the one device. [] I'd be inclined to agree with the others who've suggested using a cable instead, but it'd be good to get to the bottom of this. A "who's using what channel" utility would be good: IM (limited) E the free "Wifi Analyser" on an Android smartphone (or, I presume, tablet) is the nicest such, and also has the advantage that it's easy to move around to check what is strongest where (apparently you won't get anything similar on an Apple 'phone that hasn't been rooted because Apple block such hardware access); for XP computers, NirSoft's WirelessNetView's excellent, though not as instantly understandable as the Android one. If you do find a new strong signal, just changing the channel your router works on may fix things; although they can be set to AUTO and I think are supposed to pick the best channel when they are, IME they rarely do a good job, and AFAIK never change once they've chosen. In UK, nearly everything seems to be on channels 1, 6 or 11, apparently because those channels are far enough apart not to interfere with each other; however, selecting one in between may still be of benefit (switching ours here to 3 seems to have done so; no-one else in range is using 3). -- J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf "I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by." - Douglas Adams |
#11
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losing internet on one computer
On 12/29/2014 7:57 PM, Jo-Anne wrote:
Using WinXP on two computers on a wireless network in my home. In the last few days, I've been losing my internet connection on one of the two computers, and it's happening more and more frequently. Sometimes the icon itself disappears, sometimes not. The only way to get the connection back (I think) is to reboot. The other computer is working fine, as is my iPad. Any idea of why this is happening and what I can do about it? Thank you, Jo-Anne Thank you, everyone! I've filed your posts for reference and am ready to use a cable if needed. However, everything has been working OK for the last two or three days. When I said my other computer and my iPad on the same network had internet service when this computer didn't, I should have added that the internet radio I listen to on the second computer was "burping" a lot and the internet on it and the iPad was very slow at times. A friend who is a programmer suggested that the different computers could be reacting differently to something external happening with the internet. Two other friends said that there were major slowdowns of the internet around Christmas. I'm hoping this was a temporary glitch. Thank you again! Jo-Anne |
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losing internet on one computer
On 01/02/2015 12:19 PM, Jo-Anne wrote:
On 12/29/2014 7:57 PM, Jo-Anne wrote: Using WinXP on two computers on a wireless network in my home. In the last few days, I've been losing my internet connection on one of the two computers, and it's happening more and more frequently. Sometimes the icon itself disappears, sometimes not. The only way to get the connection back (I think) is to reboot. The other computer is working fine, as is my iPad. Any idea of why this is happening and what I can do about it? Thank you, Jo-Anne Thank you, everyone! I've filed your posts for reference and am ready to use a cable if needed. However, everything has been working OK for the last two or three days. When I said my other computer and my iPad on the same network had internet service when this computer didn't, I should have added that the internet radio I listen to on the second computer was "burping" a lot and the internet on it and the iPad was very slow at times. A friend who is a programmer suggested that the different computers could be reacting differently to something external happening with the internet. Two other friends said that there were major slowdowns of the internet around Christmas. I'm hoping this was a temporary glitch. Thank you again! Jo-Anne No, the Internet did not experience "major slowdowns" around Christmas and the one who suggested external interference due to Christmas decorations was "Paul" on the above thread. |
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