Laptop cannot connect

It appears that your friend is set up as an ad-hock network rather than access point and that your wireless is logging into the wireless card in the PC rather than the router.

What makes you think that? To set up an ad-hoc takes some pretty explicit commands. I just don't see that happening accidentally. I forget if windows complains/warns the user that they are connecting to an ad-hoc network. I know Blackberry won't all you to connect to one at all due to security risks.

miso wrote in news:jrc2df$3k8$ snipped-for-privacy@speranza.aioe.org:

is

It now appears that his router is not smart enough to determine when I have logged off and I must explicitly manually disconnect for the router to recognize that I am gone and free up one of the guest accounts. This is my latest theory now, because when I disconnect manually instead of just shutting down or disabling the adapter I am then able to re login again and get a working connection. Very funny sometimes the router asks me for the password again and sometimes it does not. I have read too many complaints about linksys routers to not think this is just bad software of the router. No it's not an adhoc connection, he bought a router for this and used the cd with (e1200 if memory serves) linksys to establish the guest accounts of which there are 5.

I think that describes every router. The way they know you have "logged off" (whatever that means) is that you've let your DHCP lease expire. If you're not using DHCP, then you never log off because you never log on.

As one of the more popular brands of consumer networking gear, it's normal for there to be more complaints. Look at all the Windows complaints, as another example.

I didn't follow the beginning of this thread closely, but a knee jerk reaction to the statement above is an obvious one: increase the number of 'guest accounts' to 50 or even 100.

Probably the E1200.

Did he already have a router, and he simply added the E1200 to facilitate your access? If so, which router is acting as the DHCP server? In other words, what are you pinging you when ping the DHCP server? Secondly, when he powers down his PC, does he also power down the router or cable/DSL modem? Does he have some or all of this equipment on a power strip, and when he flips the power off it kills everything? Is he on DSL and doing PPOE authentication on his PC versus in his router?

That was confusing at first, (password, yet unencrypted), but I think I know what you mean. The wireless connection is unencrypted (open), but when you connect to that network you're prompted for a guest password.

So much for the power strip theory. What about the PPOE auth theory?

Once again Char it sounds like you have nailed it. With out the manual disconnection the lease is still assigned to the device until it times out A new connection goes to the next guest account until they run out or one of the prior guest accounts times out and is once again open for use. I agree the increase in guest accounts will most likely take care of the problem. Sorry about the misdirection with the adhock.

Thanks. We'll see what the OP says. I could still be out to lunch. :)

Char Jackson wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

DHCP

DHCP

kills

(open),

theory?

Ok the problem appears to be as I last described. You must manually disconnect and clear the lease in order to connect again next time I power up my laptop.

I think the DHCP IP is the router IP but since I do not have admin privileges (have not asked him for that) I cannot connect to the router page to verify that. Reason my ping worked to DHCP is that the router was hearing me, it just was not allowing access until I first cleared my last guest access.

Having no trouble now as long as I manually d/c from the lease.

Also since I am using an old laptop with an old radio, I cannot log in to his main non guest connection even though he gave me the pw since my old radio only does WEP and he is using a later encryption scheme.

I'd suggest getting a usb wifi. That would get you WPA, plus you can put the wifi dongle closer to the window. alfa AWUS036H is what I would suggest.

I wouldn't want my router running WEP.

Weird. Some rhetorical questions:

1. The router may be on a seperate power strip, but what about the DSL or cable modem? Is that being powered off?

1. Did you power cycle the router AFTER the owners machine was turned off to see if it magically recovers with his machine still turned off?

2. Is the owners machine connected via wired or wireless? If wires, run IPCONFIG on his Win7 box and see if you get the usual

192.168.1.xxx or if you get a routeable IP address. If routeable, he has the CAT5 cables miswired in back of the router.

1. Check the firmware version:

Note that v1 is quite different from v2.

1. If a DSL modem on the evil AT&T, is the PPPoE login in the DSL modem, in the router, or in the owners Win7 machine? I prefer to have it in the router, but it's much easier in the modem. It should not be in the Win 7 machine. If the owners machine starts with "click here to connect to internet" it's time to reconfigure.

1. What do the lights do on the router and modem when the owner powers off his machine? I think there's an "internet" light on the router that checks for connectivity. What does it do?

Looking at the settings, there's nothing on the guest page that might cause problems.

I would guess #1 as mostly likely.

FWIW, I put the settings in the router. The 2wire DSL modem should detect you have connected a router. It turns off its firewall, expecting the router to do that.

I'm not on AT&T, but I bought one of their 2wire routers since they are very good. [I don't use it as a router or for wireless. I just use it for the modem.] Yeah, I know, the wall wart sucks. Thus far, mind hasn't failed, and I never have to boot the modem. I occasionally have to boot the linksys router to get the wifi working.

Hi Jeff, more inline below:

Jeff Liebermann wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

Have not asked explicitly but I think he's wireless judging from his huge antenna on the roof.

turned off?

See my reply to char jackson. It's working now as long as I disconnect from the adapter software before trying to come back later. Most wireless connections do not require explicit disconnect but since he is allowing 5 guest accounts maybe they are filled up if I do not d/c each time, router does not clear old no data transfer connections?

wires,

routeable, he

see above

He ran the cd from the Linksys router which he just bought so assuming firmware is current.

DSL

to have

not evil at&t

Did not see any lights when he invited me over, but did not look for them either.

My best guess is the router is not clearing stale connections unless you disconnect and clear them prior?

If that's the case, it might be the MAC address to IP address table (ARP cache), or the DHCP leases that are not getting cleared on disconnect. The ARP cache usually defaults to about 4 hrs. The DHCP leases might be set to several days. No clue if these are the correct timings for the E1200. I couldn't find settings in the E1200 router setup to change either of these.

However, if my guess(tm) is correct, you should have had no trouble reconnecting to the router. Both the ARP cache and DHCP lease tables should have had your previous connection info and allowed a DHCP lease renewal, if your computer requests a DHCP renewal, instead of a new IP address. If it asks for a new IP address, then a DHCP lease table will prevent any additional IP addresses from being allocated. Cranking up the maximum number of connection to 10 will help, but eventually it will run out of IP's.

Check for firmware updates for the E1200. It might have been fixed. However, I couldn't find anything specific in the release notes for either V1 or V2.

Put an electronic timer on the power to the router and have it do a power cycle in the middle of the night. That should clear everything. I use those for rebooting unreliable router on mountain tops.