…from my home PC (MESH running Vista).

Set up roughly is this. Broadband to ADSL router, then cables to either home or work PC. Work PC is fine – hence this post. The internet is present and correct, so there’s nowt wrong with the ADSL.

All was fine until yesterday evening, since when either Explorer or Safari do the same thing, which is go to the homepage (BBC), and perhaps one site after that (STW) but that’s it. It doesn’t freeze – for example I can ask it to go to the STW forums repeatedly – it gives me the old “contacting…” but never opens it.

I’ve checked the network diagnostics which say everything is fine & internet connection is good. Bullguard tells me there are no viruses etc. Oh, and the PC is set up with NetNanny which hasn’t caused any problems yet & seems to log me in fine.

To get t’internet on home PC involves unplugging the work PC ethernet cable and plugging in the home PC cable (work supplies the Broadband & ADSL but won’t do wireless etc.). So checking anything out does mean disconnecting one PC and reconnecting the other – hence testing for any problems does take a bit of time!

Suggestions gratefully received (other than I should have got another Mac).

To check you have basic connectivity:

Open up a cmd window – Start -> Run -> type in Cmd

Then trying pinging the sites:

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.0.6001]
Copyright (c) 2006 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\brf>ping http://www.singletrackworld.com

Pinging http://www.singletrackworld.com [94.136.38.15] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 94.136.38.15: bytes=32 time=804ms TTL=53
Reply from 94.136.38.15: bytes=32 time=668ms TTL=53
Reply from 94.136.38.15: bytes=32 time=787ms TTL=53
Reply from 94.136.38.15: bytes=32 time=640ms TTL=53

Ping statistics for 94.136.38.15:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 640ms, Maximum = 804ms, Average = 724m

Awaits input – i’m wireless on macbook and things just seem to be getting progressively slower…

I’m sure that’s useful advice, footlaps, but you lost me right at the start! Kind of assume I have basic connectivity as I can get to the first few sites / pages (can be 1 – 3 so far before it goes no further), plus the PC seems to say I have internet available. Or is all this irrelevant?

Go to the start button, click on that. Click on Run. Enter ‘cmd’ into the box.

You might be connected, but if your settings are wrong you could be missing DNS – name resolution e.g. your machine can’t resolve STW into 94.136.38.15.

If you can ping the site on the machine in question then its an application issue, if not, it’s a networking issue.

Farticus, follow footflaps instructions to the letter.

Click on the start button.

Click “Run”.

Type in the three-letter word “cmd”. This brings up a black box which you can type into.

Type “ping http://www.singletrackworld.com” then press the return key.

Take a note of what comes up in the black box.

OK, logging off here to try on the home PC. I may be some time.

You didn’t type Google into Google did you?

Sorry, I know that wasn’t at all helpful.

Bizarre…

Did what you said, trying STW and BBC. Response both times was “Ping request could not find host http:///www.bbc.co.uk. Please check the name and try again”/.

So I opened Safari, and there was the BBC homepage. It even sent to the STW homepage too, but then nothing else.

What does this tell me?!

Oh, no idea what the Google thing is about, chakaping…you’ve lost me (I’m easily lost, it seems).

No idea why but it’s suddenly started working again on the home PC. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

No idea why but it’s suddenly started working again on the home PC. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

…and now it’s random. Mostly won’t work but occasionally it does. God I hate computers.

Position so far.

Done the ping thing again, and the same response.

Happily downloaded iTunes & Quicktime updates (80mb) with no problem, during which the ping thing still still said “Ping request could not find host http:///www.bbc.co.uk. Please check the name and try again”.

Managed to get to this forum once and post the last 3 posts above, but as soon as I pressed “Send Post” that was it – it ceased to cooperate again.

Most of the time it’ll open the homepage (BBC) and go no further.

When the ADSL is hooked up to my work laptop (where I am now) there are no problems, so the router seems fine & the issue must be on the PC.

Anyone care to suggest what investigations I need to do next? It worked fine yesterday (and has done for months, well as fine as any Vista PC works), and I can’t recall doing / changing anything that could have provoked it.

Cheers.

How many slashes are you typing in the URL (http:/// or http://)?

Just catching up on things…just the 2 slashes, Nico – my typo above.

Anyway, the position has improved after I “reset winsock protocol” whatever that means. I followed the instruction on MS help, and it seems to have worked without upsetting Bullguard.

No idea why winsock went beserk, but then again I have no idea why this PC seems so tempramental.

Thanks for the help.

Windoze is such fun, ain’t it.

Hate it with a passion.