Connecting but no internet!

Yes, that much I determined (a client DNS issue). nslookup is able to look things up fine, but seemingly nothing else. The question is, what to try next to fix it!

I wouldn't have posted anything in this group - other than I was wondering if the person who posted his question, actually had similar symptoms and was possibly barking up the wrong tree.

Thanks

[POSTED TO alt.internet.wireless - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

1. Check the Status of your connection to see if the DNS servers are being set properly.
2. Try configuring your connection with DNS servers manually.

danr snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com hath wroth:

A temporary fix would be to setup this client machine with the DNS server pointing to your ISP's DNS servers, instead of pointing to the router. XP will allow you to keep using DHCP for the IP address and gateway, while using a static IP address for the DNS server(s).

I've seen this problem about 4 times and have yet to have a guaranteed fix. In ALL cases, it started immediately after the machine was attacked by some form of spyware. When the removal program (usually Ad-Aware or Spybot S&D) was done, everything worked except DNS.

I fixed one of these with a rather long and tedious solution. I booted from the XP CDROM and used the "repair" option in the installation setup. After essentially reinstalling XP, I had to also re-install *ALL* the Windoze Updates since the CD was issued. That took about 1-2 hours on a fast machine. I won't do that again.

Another method that worked when it was apparent that some networking files had been replaced by the spyware was to run: First, create a restore point. Start -> programs -> accessories -> system tools -> restore point Start -> Run -> cmd sfc /scannow It will ask for your XP cdrom. Use the CD used to install your system or you WILL make a mess. If the system came with a c:\\i386 directory with the original XP CAB's, you'll need to do some registry tweaks.

will run through your "Windoze File Protecion" list and restore anything that's been replaced. This only worked on one machine and failed on two others. Be careful with this one as there are bugs, problems, and it's a bit of a heavy hammer for a simple problem.

Another possibility is to dig throught the Windows File Protection directory at: c:\\winnt\\system32\\dllcache\\ and see if you can find anything that looks like the DNS binary. Mine has 1325 files in it, which may present a challenge.

My guess(tm) is that some key binary responsible for DNS has been replaced. However, these two stick out as a possible: 01/13/2005 01:09a 136,976 dnsapi.dll 04/08/2005 03:54a 94,480 dnsrslvr.dll Note: I'm currently on W2K, but XP is probably simiilar. The dnsrslvr.dll is the DNS Resolver, which is probably the culprit. You may need to do all this in the safe mode. Dunno.

As always, don't do anything you can't undo which in this case means save the files that you replace.

Next time, start a new thread.

Thank you for all of your posts. However i got lost half way through some of them!

Continuing from my last post:

2) netsh winsock reset: didnt work

One thing i did notice is that my laptop (that is getting internet) is a wireless B card. I had a look at the router internet based setup and made sure that the belkin router was set to 54G-Auto. Therefore i would have guessed my wireless G usb adapter would have picked it up too! I didnt have a chance to check my flatmate's computer's becuase they didnt get back till really late.

next steps:

1) Did you try changing USB Ports: yes tried it 2) "A temporary fix would be to setup this client machine with the DNS server pointing to your ISP's DNS servers, instead of pointing to the router. XP will allow you to keep using DHCP for the IP address and gateway, while using a static IP address for the DNS server(s)." - how do i do this? 3) "I've seen this problem about 4 times and have yet to have a guaranteed fix. In ALL cases, it started immediately after the machine was attacked by some form of spyware" - I've had no spyware

Jeff Liebermann: thanks i will try to repair windows, see if it works.

"Someone" hath wroth:

If you're lost, then don't do something you don't understand. Take the time to read it, Google for the buzzwords, and for clarification.

Control Panel -> Network -> Wireless Card Right click on the wireless card icon and select "properties". In the box, select TCP/IP. Set the DNS servers to those of your ISP. You can find the IP addresses in the status page of your router or on your ISP's web pile.

No. Don't do that until absolutely last. It's a big change and if done wrong will screw up more things than it fixes. If you can't understand what I posted, or read the URL on how to use SFC, then please get some experienced help. Meanwhile, just set the DNS addresses to those of your ISP and leave it alone until you can get some help.

IF nslookup works, its something to do with your browser config.

Check for browser cache settings. Remove any such. Check for dialup networking settings. Disable any such. Make sure IE is set to never dial a connection. Mark McIntyre

ISTR he said that nslookup was working. In which case its not the tcp settings, its the browser settings.

Absolutely agree. Better to remove and reinstall the network card drivers. Mark McIntyre

Try LSPFix.

you cannot download it straight to that computer, so download to another computer and copy on a floppy disk/USB/CDRom to the affected computer.

Hope this helps you, it has worked for me many times. Eli

Nope you are not looking at things using your bandwidth, as you have already told us that the wireless network statistics say that there is not much happening at all.

In fact what you are looking for can't really be categorized because there are so many variables that can be affecting performance, but potentially you are looking for something that has screwed up your connection. It's won't jump out and say "HI IM HERE" so we can't offer you a quick fix solution on this one.

The thing that I find completely odd, is that you can play games over the lan using the wireless adaptor perfectly fine, and it's only internet traffic you are having problems with.

I will admit that I am completely perplexed with that, as any performance issues you are having regarding the internet side of things should be affecting the local network side of things too (ie you should not be able to share files etc).

One thought I had - was your computer might be struggling to provide full bandwidth to the USB adaptor - but as I say because you can use the internal network with no problems, it's deffinately not that.

- I will have a quick read of the new posts I haven't yet read and think of something else.

Can you provide another link to this? as this link appears to be dead as at 23:00 22/03/2006.

Which nslookup mutation? Some of the Windowized versions allow you to set the default nameserver to an IP address. Sam Spade does that. If the IP address is the real DNS server at the ISP, nslookup will work, while nothing else will.

I'll bet on a corrupted DNS resolvr binary as I speculated in my previous rant.

Add to list of things to check... disable looking for a proxy server. Control Panel -> Internet Options -> Connection -> LAN Settings Uncheck everything.

Thank you again for all of your posts. Thanks Andy, i think your starting to see where im coming from (ie you recognise that the LAn is working but not the internet hence not a problem with the connection) I don't know if it helps the wireless property shows a lot of packets being sent (whether they are received by the router or not i dont know) but very few packets being received.

I left my computer on yesterday and it must have sent around 17000 packets but only received a couple of hundred back!

[POSTED TO alt.internet.wireless - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

Or Internet connection config, from which the browser normally gets its settings.

Check TCP/IP settings in Internet connection config. Make sure that DNS is obtained automatically.

[POSTED TO alt.internet.wireless - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

Depends on what options were used with nslookup -- the DNS server can be specified, in which case the TCP/IP DNS settings aren't used.

[POSTED TO alt.internet.wireless - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

"Google is your friend"

Yes, sorry - the link was slightly incorrect:

That should work, Eli

I was assuming the builtin windows commandline nslookup utility. Anything else isn't nslookup, its a GUI which does DNS lookups ,probably sharing settings with your browser - ie useless.

Never come acrosss this - all the dns problems I've ever seen with home PCs were down to either screwed up tcp settings (in which case no dns lookup worked) or screwed up browser config (and far too many apps use IE's settings to drive their use of tcp).

Mark McIntyre

That one defaults to the users DNS servers. In theory, that should not work if the browser doesn't work. Since it doesn't, then probably something wrong with the browser. The usual goof is to have someting in the Connections settings. Control Panel -> Internet Options -> Connection -> LAN settings. Uncheck EVERYTHING.

I've only seen the binary problem once. It was a piece of spyware that replaced the DNS resolver binary so that it would redirect users to it's idea of a suitable web site. I didn't have internet connectivity at the customers location so I couldn't lookup the appropriate removal tool. So I looked at the dates of the various binaries and found that dnsresolver.dll had been touched. I replaced it with the one from the DLLCache and everything worked.

No, it defaults to whatever is set on the TCP/IP settings, thats not user-specific.

Incorrect - the browser retains its own configuration (proxy, local server addys etc) which is on top of the TCP settings. the unix-like commandline apps don't use that.

/that/ I've heard of. Nasty trick. Mark McIntyre