Why wont my IP renew.....help!!!

[John Prophet]

I did some work today at an office. Lightning hit close evidently and knocked out their network. They had some other people looking at it..then they called in me, lol.

here's the scenario.
Its cable internet. I dont even know the setup as far as a diagram of it..there is a router..several switches...etc.
The top floor is on the internet just fine.

On the bottom floor there are some connection probs.

here is the one I am working on today.

It wont renew the IP address with Winipcfg. (Its win ME)

It says dhcp not available.

In the winipcfg it didnt show the realtek nic..it only showed "NDIS 5.0"...and when I did "release" it didnt seem to release...I tried release all and release.

There is another computer on the same hub as this one and it works fine.

I also switched the nic out even though the first nic worked fine.

I uninstalled all the network components.

So anyway, the problem is in the computer, not the network, since the other comp on the hub works fine.

What could be the problem??

(I tried winME restore but it wasnt working either, lol)

After I traded nics the new nic did show up in winipcfg but it would also not release.

Whats the deal??

The comp in question is a hp pavilion celeron.



Is there any possible way that the router could be out of dhcp addresses??


Thanks, JP

[Telexen]

That's what it sounds like to me..a lack of DHCP addresses. Check the field of addresses it's allowing.

If DHCP isn't available it should need an IP to be set manually.

[Sixpac_XP]

What type of DHCP server are they (you) using and do you know if you are on a domain?

[A.K.Arkane]

Hmm.. if we hekp ya find the problem do we get a cut in on the pay? or are ya getting paid for it?

[John Prophet]

yes, whoever contributes the winning idea can claim part of my fee! lol.


No, there is no domain....there are no "servers".....just a bunch of comps with cable internet and a internet router and several switches etc. The comps that share stuff are just in a workgroup.

I am sure it is a little internet gateway type router....though to be honest I dont even know where it is, lol. I dont think its in the utility closet cuz I glanced in there and it looked like two switches to me....maybe one was a router.

I do know the gateway is 192.168.1.1 and so is the dhcp and dns server addies, so by that I guess I can assume its just a little internet "router" somewhere in the building, lol.

Its one of those situations where everyone and their cousin has worked on the network, and I have no idea who put it in...and as far as I can see, none of it is labeled, lol. I dont know what connects to what. And you know how it works..they aint gonna want to pay you to go back and map the thing out like the first guy shoulda done. There are switches upstairs, switches downstairs etc.

The comp I was working on today is on a hub with another comp in the same room and two other cat5 cables from the hub going who knows where.

So thats how I sorta have it limited down to the comp, cuz the other comp on the hub is working fine.

Why would it be out of dhcp addresses now if it was working fine before? Unless the router was reset to default settings (or something) by whoever worked on it before I got there, lol.

But why wont the WINIPCFG utility release the nic? When I click 'release all" shouldnt I see everything go to zero..or would I have to click "release all" and then start Winipcfg over to see it released??

The router being out of DHCP addresses wouldnt have anything to do with winipcfg not RELEASING would it??

I guess tommorrow I will try to, first of all, find the router, lol....see what brand etc it is..then try to access it from the network to see how it is configured.

but if it is truly just out of IP addresses, then I could determine that by releasing some of the leases and not renewing them..correct?? In other words free up some addies and then try to renew the comp in question??

I guess I will also take the other two cat5 cables out of the hub since I have no clue what they go to..just to see if somehow one of them is interfering with my dhcp somehow..(like someone has ICS on or something)


Any further ideas?

Thanks, JP

[Siliconjunkie]

Ok, you ruled out my first guess of a bad NIC. Try giving it a static IP, then see if you can ping 192.168.1.1 . If you still have problems uninstall and reinstall TCP/IP from the network properties. Make sure you choose an IP that isnt in use. I would try something like 192.168.1.250, ping it first to see if anyone is home.

Have you tried another cable or port on the hub? Perhaps the NIC in another slot?

[John Prophet]

OK, i did switch the cat5 cable to the known good port on the hub that the other comp in the room is using....it didnt change anything..and I also put the working comp on the port that the non working comp WAS on...so its not a port or cable issue, cuz I did try another cable also.

When I removed the nic it removed all the networking components. Plus I removed em myself a few times and reinstalled em. I did notice that under "primary logon" the w98 comp that was working was set on 'microsoft family logon" as opposed to "client for msoft networks"..I tried that both ways but made no difference.

As far as pinging...I tried pinging 192.168.1.1..to no avail...also I tried pinging 192.168.1.29...which is one of the other comps on the hub..but I got nothing....i cant remember if I tried after I switched nics....but i think the other nic was probly ok anyway, both nics would self ping.

Weird to have one comp on a hub working but not the other, lol.

if I give it a static and it works, what will that have proved? Will that tell me that the comp is ok and that most likely the problem is the router, possibly being out of addies?

JP

[John Prophet]

What about simply power cycling the main router? lol

I dont know the brand or anything, of the router yet...I suppose I wont know much till I go to the router config page. (hopefully its a nice easy to work with router, lol)

JP

[Telexen]

Couldn't hurt to reset it...do you even know where it's located at this point?

[John Prophet]

nope, hehe. I know where the cable modem is..and then there is a utility closet with what i thought were two switches...could be a router and a switch tho. Ill look tomorrow. Its a large realty office with two floors and lotssssssss of rooms..each with a computer. The bad thing is that I dont have a cable continuity tester...or what do they call em...."fox and hound" type deal...to map out cables..cuz I dont think any of it is labled.

Grrrr.

JP