Dropping internet connection...

[Cleveland Metal]

Just the last day, with no changes, my kids PC that he uses at my parents house. Watching his AOL, he drops connection every 7 minutes, and then reconnects after 5 minutes. Over and over, same things... Affecting browser when off as well.

Cable co, says all is well up to the modem. Blames the network card.

PC connected directly to modem, no router. Running XP Pro sp2 Windows firewall only

Any thoughts?

[CharvelRocker]

Is it a cable connection?

EDIT: Could well be the ground cable to your house is in bad shape. Ours had an issue where water would get in it during the day as it warmed up and expanded, thus disrupting the internet, as it caused massive packet loss to where the internet could not maintain a connection of any kind, but was sitll able to channel a cable TV signal.

[petedz]

I'd get the cable company to check the modem signal again. I went through something like that with my provider for a few months/dozen support calls before they acknowledged and fixed the problem.

[thebeggar]

It could definitely be feasible that it is the modem. Got a spare? Or a spare network card? Or could you bring his pc back to your place to test? Start simple take it from there.
Even though the cable co says no probs their end....... well I reckon they are programmed to say that. DENY EVERYTHING.

[Cleveland Metal]

Yes, cable broadband to modem, then USB to the PC.


Scanned for maleware and virus. I'll figure it's the network card, and will take one over and see. Will also take another PC almost identical to his to see if "it" does it...

Figured I'd ask the gurus at large here for any tidbits tho

[Soap]

The nic has two lights in the back.
Look and see if they are on, the yellowish/amber light should always be on no matter what. The green one will blink periodically and at times stay on for a limited time.

With that said,
If you have no lights showing your nic is dead or the patch cable to the nic is bad.

Like you said, it's best to take a working patch cable with you and etc to adequately troubleshoot it.

Post back when you can and tell us what you learned and if need be we'll go from there. Remember, don't over think troubleshooting... do the obvious or simplest first, then go from there.

[Norton]

Oh, I thought you were canceling your web connection membership, when I read the title.

[Jack The Riffer]

Of course everything looks good up to the modem, they are probably running their tests during the up times. They should run "ping your modem -t" to see if it drops out after a while. Of course they should substitute your modem with the actual address of the modem.

[LouSiffer]

I don't buy the sporadic modem theory. It's possible, but, unlikely in my opinion. I would say its the card. I had similar issues with my onboard network. It took a dump. Had to buy a slotted card. -Lou

[Cleveland Metal]

This is true, haha... Seems to be fine, WHEN IT IS FINE, haha...

-t? Is that a IT term?

[Cleveland Metal]

I don't buy the sporadic modem theory. It's possible, but, unlikely in my opinion. I would say its the card. I had similar issues with my onboard network. It took a dump. Had to buy a slotted card. -Lou

Yeah, it's a generic low cost card. I'll swap it later today. Just gotta look around and find one here somewhere. Should have a new one in the box I believe

[Robert Hendrix]

I had a similar problem that plagued my home PC for awhile. Turned out it was spyware

[Cleveland Metal]

I was concerned it was some sort of malware as well, I've heard that some keyloggers will act this way. But, so far, nothing is showing up and we've scanned it with a few different programs that I've found to be very capable. Never kno tho, haha...

I recently got hit with a Vundo Variant that was a serious bitch to get rid of. Would rename itself on every boot.

[Soap]

I recall when I did internet support/helpdesk for a local outfit.
A great introductory job to learn the basics of internet support.

Anyhoo, we (2nd shift team) for like 3-4 days kept getting a repeat caller have intermittent problems getting booted off the internet.
Naturally your first course of action would be check the callers internet settings were right. Even if you knew this wasn't the reason or source of the problem it was a good routine to check and verify the settings were correct. This eliminated and answered a lot of questions right off the bat.

Everybody myself included, were thinking since we knew the nic and dsl modem (hardware) was function properly and comunicating correctly and settings (software) were right, that cleared us. Meaning, we only provided support for our software and hardware only and the supervisor reminded us of this regularly. Anything else out on the internet the customer was responsible for, not us.

I got the call that made the difference.
She called and the call came through to me.
I asked, "are you browsing the internet when this happens?"
I know this seems dumb but it tells me if its happened to caller or another member in the family.
Either way it gets me where I need to be, talking with the right person.

She responds, yes.
I ask, "is there any chance you remember the web site your on when this happens?"
She responds, a gaming web site where I go to play Chess online.

Two things come to my mind.
What browser is she using? Also, we may have an issue with this web site and it may not be her PC like she thinks.

I ask, " what browser are you using?
She responds, AOL's browser.
Do you have another browser you can try, like IE or FireFox?
She responds, I have both those browsers, but I want to use AOL's browser they send me in the mail.
I respond, "just for the moment maam, I'd like for you to try one of the two browsers I mentioned to see if it kicks you off, can you do that?"
She responds, yes, will you stay on the line with me?
I respond, "yes maam I will."

To make a long scenario short, she never got kicked off using Firefox or IE but evertime she went to that web site with AOL's browser she got kicked off.

Of course, she wants to use AOL's browser. Imagine that?
Anyway, I share with her if she wants to continue using AOL's browser you need to call them for support regarding their browser and possible the web site that it happens on. We don't provide support for AOL software or any gaming web sites we don't support. The only software we support is the software available at our web site.

Needless to say the problem was solved BUT not like she wanted.

With that said, don't rule out your options when troubleshooting using a different browser if need be, or learning what web sites does the problem/s occur.

[Cleveland Metal]

Ok.... It's getting interesting...

I take a PC there, plug in, it works fine... Plug his back in, loses connect after 7 minutes, takes five to get it back... rinse repaet, same issue... My PC works great there, his doesn't

I take HIS PC to my house, it works fine here but not at his house...

I do have a wired router and he plugs direct into the modem.

WTF...