Computer Geek Help

J.C.

J.C.

Volunteer
Moderator
Joined
Apr 18, 2005
Location
Greensboro, NC
Computer Geek Help - The Fix Is In - Winner - Dianne!

My wife's computer all of a sudden will not browse or check email. When she types an address such as, http://www.nc4x4.com, she gets a page cannot be displayed error, but when she types in, 209.51.142.186, it works fine. Can go to Google with the numbers and google something but when you click on a result you get the page error. Her email would not check at pop-server.triad.rr.com but when I changed it to 25.24.4.161 it checkes it fine. Any tips on how to fix this? Unfortunately Road Runner tech support was no help :( They said a router problem but my computer continued to work fine as before. TIA
Computer Novice :)
 
Sounds like DNS to me. Check and see if her DNS addresses match the ones on your computer John. DNS is what translates the names to IP addresses for your computer.
 
CYJKrawler said:
My wife's computer all of a sudden will not browse or check email. When she types an address such as, http://www.nc4x4.com, she gets a page cannot be displayed error, but when she types in, 209.51.142.186, it works fine. Can go to Google with the numbers and google something but when you click on a result you get the page error. Her email would not check at pop-server.triad.rr.com but when I changed it to 25.24.4.161 it checkes it fine. Any tips on how to fix this? Unfortunately Road Runner tech support was no help :( They said a router problem but my computer continued to work fine as before. TIA
Computer Novice :)
Click to expand...

Do this:

Click START --> Run --> Type CMD and click OK

You should now have a black command window

Type ipconfig /all

You should get a bunch of IP addresses on your screen. Write down the IP addresses for the DNS servers.

Call road runner and make sure the ip addresses you have for DNS servers are correct are correct.
 
unplug your RR cable modem wait a min or 2 and reboot your PC it will cycle everything. Your PC gets its settigs off the cable modem. Your could just be working off cached info...
 
Sounds like spyware to me. Install adaware from www.lavasoft.com, run it, let it clean it. If that doesn't work try spybot (do a google search for it) If that doesn't work, try hijackthis. Be careful of hijackthis, it works well, but you have to know what your doing or you'll remove something you will need.
 
Also try this, go to a command prompt, type ipconfig /flushdns. This will flush out your DNS cache.
 
There's several things that may be causing this, one major item might be a firewall. Try disabling it. The other is corrupt winsock files.

To fix it you can try rebuilding the winsock files in the registry but that's kinda tricky for a new computer person.

Your best bet, if it's windows xp, is to run the system restore to a date before you lost your connection.

Write me if you need some help.
 
chuckwhut said:
firefox :)
Click to expand...

Can you explain to me how using a different browser will correct DNS resolution errors ??

Just curious as to how you came up with that...

The tcp/ip stack remains the same no matter what browser uses it.
 
Diane, it might not be a DNS issue, I've seen spyware affect IE like this here at work. Course I just had a case where an MS patch broke some HP picture sharing software, causing IE not to work unless you typed in http:\\ every time you went to a website, wouldn't accept www.whatever.com by itself.

What has changed on the computer between the time it worked, and the time it didn't? Anything installed, downloaded, etc?
 
Sounds like what my old router used to always do to me.
On my computer it would not properly pass DNS after I played UT for more than 1 hour. (Wife kept telling me that meant for me to NOT play video games that long but oh well)
Try either rebooting your router (since you mentioned 2 computers, one working one not, i am guessing you have a router) to see if that fixes it.
If that doesn't fix it, go to a command prompt.
Start, run, then "cmd"
At the prompt type:
ipconfig/release
ipconfig/renew

That will release all the settings and then supposedly renew them.
If it still does not work you will need to go to the TCP/IP settings.
Start
Control Panel
Network Connections
Then Right Click and Properties.
Scroll down to "Internet Protocol TCP/IP"
Properties
Make sure it has "Obtain DNS server address automatically" pushed in. And make sure the preferred DNS and alternate DNS are empty.
Press OK, exit out, then do the
ipconfig/release
ipconfig/renew again.

If it still doesn't work do a
ipconfig/all
and paste everything you get from that in here, or you can IM me with it, hscrugby on AIM, or chris.humphries on gtalk, or pm me and we can figure it out the rest of the way.
Assuming it still isn't working, or I could just be rambling.

Cheers.
 
And the winner is............Dianne :) Prize must be claimed in person at the station before the end of the month. Thanks for all the help guys and gals. I did try all the suggestions to no avail and finally contacted HP support, which I absolutely hate to do but this time I got someone who spoke decent English and was very friendly. They had me delete my windsock and windsock2 in the registry and reinstall the TCP/IP thingy. Worked fine after that. Thanks again for the suggestions.
 
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