Can't connect to the internet in Windows Vista

I have a Windows Vista computer which i have used for about 2 years without any issues. Recently, i started having problems connecting to the internet with this Vista computer. My other XP Computers are fine and can connect to the Internet.

Regardless of wired or wireless connection, i am unable to get the Vista computer connected to the web. The Status remains "Limited" for IPv4 and IPv6. It also shows unidentified Public Network, and is able to connect to the router. However, there's a disconnection between the router and the internet.

Any help will be greatly appreciated, i have been on this for 4 weeks now.

Kola

Posted 2010-12-13T22:04:33.543

Reputation: 11

2All caps isn't cool. – Joel Coehoorn – 2010-12-13T22:16:53.707

Answers

I would skip some troubleshooting on this and just reset the tcp/ip stack. If that doesn't work then start toubleshooting.

Use a manual method to reset TCP/IP

To open a command prompt, click Start and then click Run. Copy and paste (or type) the following command in the Open box and then press ENTER:

cmd

At the command prompt, copy and paste (or type) the following command and then press ENTER:

netsh int ip reset

Reboot the computer.

Chris Harrod

Posted 2010-12-13T22:04:33.543

Reputation: 269

Basic troubleshooting.

Can you ping the router? If so the connection to this is ok.
Can you ping other computers on the network by their computer name or by IP Address? If so then your router is servicing internal requests ok
Can you ping 173.194.36.104 - Google's IP address. - If so outside connections are ok. Can you ping www.google.com? If so then your DNS server is working.

If you can do all this then I would test if you can use another browser.
Also check that no proxy setting have been put in place. Opera doesn't use the default ones shared by IE, FF and Chrome. Maybe try that.

If all that fails comment back and we'll go on to more advanced things.

Joe Taylor

Posted 2010-12-13T22:04:33.543

Reputation: 11 533

I was able to ping 173.194.36.104, however, i was unable to ping www.google.com – Kola – 2010-12-14T15:27:34.333

Sounds like you're having a DNS issue then. DO you use your router as a DNS server? Does your Vista machine have a different DNS config than your XP machines. You could try manually setting the DNS server to use as 8.8.8.8 which is Google's DNS server. See if you can ping google.com then. – Joe Taylor – 2010-12-14T18:55:58.457

Well, it has now gone down again, and says "Local". The Network Sharing says "Identifying..." for almost 30 minutes now. So the intrernet seems to be up and down, and when it comes up, then i am able to only ping the above. Also, when it was up, i could only get to some sites, and only IE worked – Kola – 2010-12-14T19:35:04.293

Update - I put in a default gateway of "192.168.1.1" and this actually seems to have forced the Default Gateway. So, now, i am able to get to google web page, ping 173.194.36.104, but unable to still ping www.google.com and I am not able to navigate from google webpage from any of the browsers – Kola – 2010-12-14T19:57:27.213

Changing DNS Server to 8.8.8.8, and still could not hig www.google.com – Kola – 2010-12-14T20:05:03.840

Have you tried resetting the TCP/IP stack as Chris mentions? Exhausting what we have I'd give that a go. Also test if setting your IP address to static helps? – Joe Taylor – 2010-12-14T22:04:53.883