Yesterday the laptop stopped being able to access the internet. Neither IE or Firefox would reliably pull up a webpage. When it was able to connect to some it was slow or it would never show the images. Moving from one part of the house didn’t seem to help much. One time sitting just a couple feet from the router it worked OK.
Today it still didn’t work on the internet. It saw the home network OK and I could FTP to the net just fine. Winamp played shoutcast streams just fine and Google Earth worked fine. I turned off the firewall. I emptied both browsers cache files. I ran Ad-Aware, Ewido Spyware & AVG Anti-virus. I plugged it directly into the router with a Cat5 cable. Still no internet, so I started poking around in the settings.
Under “network Settings” on the Control Panel, I right clicked for properties on Local Area Connection, selected Internet Protocol and clicked on the Properties button. “Use the following DNS server addresses” was selected and they were set to 85.255.xxx.xxx on the laptop while the desktop had “Obtain DNS server address automatically” selected. Changed the setting to automatic, repeated the process for the Wireless Network Connection and we were back in business surfing the web.
I don’t understand all I know about home networking, but how did those settings change? Malicious hackers? I put those addresses in there when I set up the wireless network and something changed Saturday?
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 399
The top transition count today equals what it was for all of last year. The extra transitions are attributable to Donna’s reaction to the chemo and radiation treatments which has turned her into heat and direct sunlight averse. Before we would make the quick trip home on summer afternoons with the top down in 100 degree weather, this year we opted to put the top up and use the AC so she would be more comfortable. And when Donna’s comfortable, Brian is comfortable.