[Seamus_Jsy]

I travel with work a lot and recently purchased a netbook to use in the hotel (WIFI) in the evenings. When I use it at home I connect with out any problems using wireless but when I stayed in the hotel I get limited or no connectivity. I clicked the repair option and every time the laptop found the router (there were 4 available and same probelm on each one) it would time out whilst repairing. It would always happen when trying to renew my IP address. To check it wasnt just my laptop I took my work laptop back to the hotel and had all the same problems. I phoned reception and they reset the router but still I couldnt get on.

Can someone please explain how I can either change the IP myself or what else could be done. Im not that good at these sought of things so if you do post could you explain in layman terms please? Oh, and Im away again to the same hotel on Monday and would love it if you could come back to me before I go! Thanks for your help.

[TerryNet]

You're sure you were trying to connect to the hotel's network? Were all four of the ones you detected the hotel's? If so, I would expect no more than one of them to be of good or strong signal strength.

Do you have a non-Windows firewall that is configured to allow your home network, but not others?

Probably won't reveal anything useful, but please show for your current wireless connection ...

Start, Run, CMD, OK to open a command prompt:
(For Vista type CMD in the Search box after Start)

Type the following command:

IPCONFIG /ALL

[Note that there is no space between the slash and ALL.]

Right click in the command window and choose Select All, then hit Enter.
Paste the results in a message here.

If necessary use a text file and removable media to copy the results to a computer with internet access.

[DoubleHelix]

If the problem only occurred at one hotel, I'd say the problem was at their end. I've stayed at quite a few hotels that offered free wireless connectivity which turned out to be incredibly crappy. Slow speeds. Dropped connections.

[TerryNet]

And the older the router and the newer (e.g., Vista) the operating system the more likely to have problems.

[Seamus_Jsy]

Thanks for coming back to me. Here is the IP config.......... By the way Ive got XP

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.
C:\Documents and Settings\shop>IPCONFIG/ALL
Windows IP Configuration
Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : your-9a6adca76b
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Unknown
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:
Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Marvell Yukon 88E8040 PCI-E Fast Eth
ernet Controller
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-13-77-B4-A4-5E
Ethernet adapter Wireless Network Connection:
Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Atheros AR5007EG Wireless Network Ad
apter
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-21-63-F6-C9-16
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.35
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : 04 July 2009 22:17:19
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : 07 July 2009 22:17:19
C:\Documents and Settings\shop>

[Seamus_Jsy]

Oh, and all 4 werent the hotels only one was. But at least two of them had at least 3 bars on the signal strength. My thinking was if I could connect, even if badly, to one of them then it was the hotel and not the laptop. As it was non of them worked.

I run McAfee firewall but made sure I switched it all off when I started getting the problem to see if this would make a difference but it didnt.

[TerryNet]

Sometimes people "protect" their wireless networks with MAC Address filtering or by requiring a static IP address. Those methods are easy to crack if you know how, but most of us don't. So, trying those other networks is a good strategy, but failure doesn't really prove anything.

The ipconfig /all gives me no hints about what might be the trouble at the hotel. The only things I can suggest are to make sure you have the latest wireless driver from your PC manufacturer's web site, and use ethernet if the hotel provides it.