No internet - only on windows PCs

Hathaway

Hathaway

Hathaway

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17 Jan 2009
Posts
236
Apologies for the long post but I've covered a fair bit of ground already and I'm hoping some bright techie can help figure this one out for me.

Both my PCs (Windows 10) no longer connect to the Internet. I've tried both wired (intel 82579v network adapter) and wireless (netgear wna3100) connections but neither work (second pc is the same, neither wired nor wireless work). All the screencaps I post will be from my main PC as I've not tried troubleshooting on the media PC as yet. Here is a screencap of my network settings, showing my wireless plugged in: https://i.imgsafe.org/fe163e7ec4.jpg. Strangely, it shows Internet Access at the bottom and then contradicts itself above. It also shows the wired logo when it's wireless oddly.

After googling around, and windows diagnosing a dns issue (https://i.imgsafe.org/101bec83e9.jpg), I tried flushing my dns as can be seen here: https://i.imgsafe.org/fe223d634f.jpg. This didn't work after restarting. I also input a dns address manually via opendns and this also had no effect.
I've tried uninstalling my network adapters and reinstalling them via the device manager (oddly a load of WAN miniports showed up that weren't displaying before), to no avail. I've reset my modem (bt home hub 5) without success. All other wired or wireless devices are unaffected by whatever issue I have on my desktop PC. I also tried restoring the PC to an earlier restore point via system restore from a week ago, again with no success.
No browsers or applications connect to the Internet at all.
The only firewall I have is the standard windows firewall. Likewise I'm running Windows defender as my only anti-virus.

I ran Malwarebytes but found nothing, while superantispyware found merely tracking cookies (now deleted). Windows defender found nothing wrong either.

I've not been able to access the router via any browser (comes up fine on my phone though). While I have a bt home hub I'm actually with plusnet, though that shouldn't make any difference here (setup has been running well for months). Attempting to access it gives me the generic cannot access this Web page response via two different browsers. Through chrome this is the information I get back: https://i.imgsafe.org/1040dbd81f.jpg.

Not sure if it's relevant or not but for the briefest moment I seemed to have some success with this method:
ipconfig /flushdns
ipconfig /registerdns
ipconfig /release
ipconfig /renew
in the command prompt. Showed I had Internet on the taskbar but the browser refused to display Web pages and then it went back to how it was. Tried it again but nothing changed that time... very frustrating!

I've also tried resetting the TCP/IP stack, results can be seen here: https://i.imgsafe.org/111086ef84.jpg. I've also gone into windows settings and tried a network reset there, again no change after restarting the PC.

I'm really at a loss as to how to proceed now so I hope someone can help me. Thank you.
If you need any additional info, please ask.
 
Wasn't there that windows update that mucked up DHCP? When connected, do you have an IP? (Cmd prompt-> ipconfig /all)

If you don't, give the PC a static address on the same subnet as the router and do another windows update.

If you do have an IP (On the same subnet as the LAN interface of the router) then do some simple tests, for example can you ping the Google DNS servers? 8.8.8.8 for example.

Also post up contents of the hosts file located in c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc
 
i had to talk a relative through setting a static IP for a similar issue.

Other devices including a win 8.1 laptop remained un effected.
 
HoneyBadger said:
Wasn't there that windows update that mucked up DHCP? When connected, do you have an IP? (Cmd prompt-> ipconfig /all)

If you don't, give the PC a static address on the same subnet as the router and do another windows update.

If you do have an IP (On the same subnet as the LAN interface of the router) then do some simple tests, for example can you ping the Google DNS servers? 8.8.8.8 for example.

Also post up contents of the hosts file located in c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc
Click to expand...

When running that command prompt I do have have several IP addresses listed (ipv6, ipv4, dhcp server etc), which one should I be taking note of? Nothing looks out of place but then this isn't an area I'm much familiar with.
Am I okay to screencap and post that up here too?

I tried pinging google as suggested but only get timed out.

As for giving the PC a static IP address on the same subnet as the router, I'm afraid I've absolutely no idea how to do that. I would need a little guidance I'm afraid :(

I would post up the contents of the host file but it's hugely bloated with Web addresses which have apparently been added by spybot - many hundreds by my guess. Is there any part in particular that's relevant? Or am I looking at a potential culprit? I don't have spybot search and destroy anymore (though that program's list is still there in the file), but I do have spybot anti-beacon installed (on someone else's advice). This software has its own list of a lot of Microsoft sites. But I'm guessing given its function that that's to be expected anyway?
 
At the command prompt what do the following commands return?

Ping 192.168.1.254
Tracert 192.168.1.254
Ping 8.8.8.8
Tracert 8.8.8.8

Then follow these instructions to set a static IP:

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/19249/how-to-assign-a-static-ip-address-in-xp-vista-or-windows-7/

I'm going to guess an IP to use for your network which hopefully is in the middle and not already in use.

So

IP set to 192.168.1.50
Subnet 255.255.255.0
Default gateway 192.168.1.254 (this seems to be the address of your router)

DNS 8.8.8.8
DNS 8.8.4.4

Then see if you're on the internet. If not then please try the above four tests and see f you get the same results.
 
Results from initial tests: https://i.imgsafe.org/3849e92553.jpg

Changed the details to the ones you gave me. No immediate change to the Internet. Restarted to be sure but nothing.

I wasn't sure whether you wanted me to rerun the tests with the same details or include the new IP, so I did both. The results were the same.

Should I be retrieving any information or resetting anything via my router's settings? I'm wary of creating more problems of course but if it's a way to progress...
I am able to access the admin area and I can see the page which lists Hub IP Gateway Address, DHCP Server and DHCP Network Range, for example.
 
Well this is very odd indeed. Absolutely no traffics is leaving your PC it would seem, not even on the local network.

For a start put your PC back to using DHCP (get IP address automatically) if you've not done so already.

Id be interested to see if your PC can "see" anything on your subnet.

Download this and get it to ping the range 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.1.254 and see what, if anything, it finds.

http://angryip.org/download/#mac
 
On another device check your IP address on your router to make sure the default gateway is correct. BT hubs have there IP address as 192.168.1.254 not sure any others do.
 
You can't ping your router which is why you can't get out on the net.

Have you installed/changed anything? Can you verify windows firewall status?

As a test, ping the local loop back address. This should always reply, so ping 127.0.0.1 - does it reply?
 
BigT said:
Well this is very odd indeed. Absolutely no traffics is leaving your PC it would seem, not even on the local network.

For a start put your PC back to using DHCP (get IP address automatically) if you've not done so already.

Id be interested to see if your PC can "see" anything on your subnet.

Download this and get it to ping the range 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.1.254 and see what, if anything, it finds.

http://angryip.org/download/#mac
Click to expand...

Should I be resetting the DNS back to automatic as well?
I've tried downloading and installing that application using the installer but after installation it wouldn't load. Checked the task manager and it wasn't showing. I do have java installed but as I wasnt sure whether it was 32 or 64 bit I installed via the installer as it suggested... this thing is fighting me every step :/

holdin09 said:
On another device check your IP address on your router to make sure the default gateway is correct. BT hubs have there IP address as 192.168.1.254 not sure any others do.
Click to expand...

The hub IP gateway address, as it labels it, is 192.168.1.254.

HoneyBadger said:
You can't ping your router which is why you can't get out on the net.

Have you installed/changed anything? Can you verify windows firewall status?

As a test, ping the local loop back address. This should always reply, so ping 127.0.0.1 - does it reply?
Click to expand...

I've not installed anything new recently. The night before I was in game and using discord as I'd been doing for weeks before. Logged in the following evening and it sprung this surprise on me. Though the media PC is experiencing the same issues. I hadn't had that on for at least a week before.

Results from ping test: https://i.imgsafe.org/3a0c9cb764.jpg

And thanks guys for sticking with this. I really appreciate your taking the time out to help.
 
If you haven't already done so try safe mode with networking.

If there's still no network try live booting a linux distribution. That'll at least prove whether there's a hardware issue.
 
I may be a little closer to understanding what's going on. I noticed looking back at screencaps that flight mode was showing under networks. I tried toggling it on the main pc, didn't toggle on or off, it was just there. An example of this is in my first screenshot in the OP.
So I went onto the media PC and it was showing there too. I've not really taken much notice before so I'm not sure if it's always been there. However it did toggle on, and then off. Now I have Internet access on the media PC. I've looked into ways of turning flight mode off but run into a bit of a brick wall for the main PC.

This is a screencap of my media PC now. In the settings you can see a flight mode option: https://i.imgsafe.org/3a7cae3ae4.jpg

This is a screencap of my main PC now. No flight mode and curiously after a restart, the option has gone from the taskbar too: https://i.imgsafe.org/3a84c7aa4e.jpg

Does this sound like I'm on to something? Could a windows update have triggered flight mode or something? I wouldn't have toggled it on by accident on two separate machines.
But how do I force it off if it is on? The media PC toggled on before back off indicating it thought it was off in the first place. So I'm not even sure of this.
 
Hathaway said:
I may be a little closer to understanding what's going on. I noticed looking back at screencaps that flight mode was showing under networks. I tried toggling it on the main pc, didn't toggle on or off, it was just there. An example of this is in my first screenshot in the OP.
So I went onto the media PC and it was showing there too. I've not really taken much notice before so I'm not sure if it's always been there. However it did toggle on, and then off. Now I have Internet access on the media PC. I've looked into ways of turning flight mode off but run into a bit of a brick wall for the main PC.

This is a screencap of my media PC now. In the settings you can see a flight mode option: https://i.imgsafe.org/3a7cae3ae4.jpg

This is a screencap of my main PC now. No flight mode and curiously after a restart, the option has gone from the taskbar too: https://i.imgsafe.org/3a84c7aa4e.jpg

Does this sound like I'm on to something? Could a windows update have triggered flight mode or something? I wouldn't have toggled it on by accident on two separate machines.
But how do I force it off if it is on? The media PC toggled on before back off indicating it thought it was off in the first place. So I'm not even sure of this.
Click to expand...

Yep looks like an issue, try the link below

http://www.howto-connect.com/fix-airplane-mode-issues-in-windows-10/
 
Ugh, just realised I'd unplugged my wifi adapter. Plugging it back in brought back flight mode. Unfortunately toggling it on and off again has no effect on this PC. It was already showing as off like the media PC.
Starting to grind my gears now lol.
 
Ok further update. I now have Internet access. After plugging the wifi back in, it states its connected in the task bar when you mouse overlay. However just like in the first screencap in the OP it contradicts that when you look at the network options, saying no Internet. It also showed the ethernet symbol and not the wifi. So I unplugged the ethernet cable and voila, lovely internets!

I've absolutely no idea why two separate machines are displaying the same problems at exactly the same time but with different solutions. The media PC is working fine through ethernet, my main machine is not.

Anyone have any ideas why wifi would work but not wired? The fact the ethernet symbol is displaying while wifi is on seems to indicate there is some overriding function at work.
 
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