Solved: Wired Knocks Wireless Offline +

My two sons' setup is this:
They both have Windows XP (32bit Home).
They have a cable modem and a RangeMax Wireless Router.
One computer is hooked directly to the router; the other is through Netgear Wireless Adapter (Rangemax 240 USB).
For some reason the wireless has started to get knocked offline whenever the wired connects.
The wireless also has NO "Local Area Connection" icon - even when he is connected.
I have changed the wired's IP address to make sure there was no conflict - DHCP is on.
I have tried to reset and restore many things and turned off firewall on the wireless...
Any ideas would be welcome.

 

Are you SURE the modem is connected to the WAN/Internet port of the router and not the LAN/Network ports?

Let's see this for the machine that is properly connected.


Hold the Windows key and press R, then type CMD then press Enter to open a command prompt:

In the command prompt window that opens, type type the following command:

Note that there is a space before the /ALL, but there is NOT a space after the / in the following command.

IPCONFIG /ALL

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

If you are on a machine with no network connection, use a floppy, USB disk, or a CD-RW disk to transfer a text file with the information to allow pasting it here.

 

This is the wireless info - the one that gets knocked offline when the wired goes online

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

C:\Documents and Settings\Quinton>ipconfig /all

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : benedict
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcast
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection 3:

Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Realtek PCIe GBE Family Controller
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 90-E6-BA-0F-E1-9E

Ethernet adapter {993E0DBC-ABC7-4E49-B142-D64E6CB34C37}:

Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : NETGEAR RangeMax(TM) 240 Wireless US
B 2.0 Adapter WPNT121 #11 - Packet Scheduler Miniport
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-14-6C-AA-38-DE

C:\Documents and Settings\Quinton>

This is the information from the computer that is connected directly to the router

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

C:\Documents and Settings\Adam>ipconfig /all

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : Jerk
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcast
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : Yes
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : Yes

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : NVIDIA nForce 10/100/1000 Mbps Ether
net
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-18-F3-E9-04-A8
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.3
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. . . . . . . . . . : Saturday, April 17, 2010 5:43:20 PM
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Sunday, April 18, 2010 5:43:20 PM

C:\Documents and Settings\Adam>

 

If you connect that non-working machine with a cable to the router, does it work in that case?

 

Moving the whole computer to where the router is, and using the onboard ethernet seems like a last resort.
I have another clue:
When we disable the connection on the wired and start the wireless computer, we still cannot get online.. we have to turn off the wired computer, then restart the wireless to get it online (since we have no ICON to click and select to connect)
We disabled the wired connection then turned off the computer
Turned on the wireless computer and waited for it to go online
Turned on the wired computer and enabled the connection - they both stay online.

The missing connection icon in "Network Connections" must also be some clue... why is it not there? There is no way of looking at the properties of his connection.

 

I'd reset the router to factory defaults and reconfigure it. Something seems amiss there.

 

Here is the ip for when the wireless is online. Also the string of numbers and letters after the Ethernet adapter is strange...

C:\Documents and Settings\Quinton>ipconfig /all

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : benedict
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Unknown
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection 3:

Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Realtek PCIe GBE Family Controller
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 90-E6-BA-0F-E1-9E

Ethernet adapter {993E0DBC-ABC7-4E49-B142-D64E6CB34C37}:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : NETGEAR RangeMax(TM) 240 Wireless US
B 2.0 Adapter WPNT121 #11 - Packet Scheduler Miniport
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-14-6C-AA-38-DE
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.4
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. . . . . . . . . . : Sunday, April 18, 2010 1:36:29 PM
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Monday, April 19, 2010 1:36:29 PM

C:\Documents and Settings\Quinton>

 

Almost sounds like they are trying to grab the same IP address

I assume you get no message popping up that there is an IP conflict?

If you have one computer set to a fixed IP address, I'm thinking you should turn off DHCP totally and just set the IP address on both systems.

 

Connection Services was arleady started (manual).
How do I turn off DHCP and give an ISP to the computer?

 

Today the "irregular" way of connecting didn't work - so I had them shut down both computers and unplug both the modem and router from power and then after a minute plug the modem in and after cycle plug in the router - they were able to connect the irregular way (disable wired connection through tray and shut down then boot up wireless computer to go online then boot wired and enable connection.)
I am wondering what happened to prevent a hookup without recycling the modem and router....

 

I'm wondering if both the modem and the router have DHCP capability and are fighting each other.

What's the model of the modem?

 

Hi Bernardo - thanks for helping.

The modem is RCA DCM425
Router is Netgear 824 v3
Adapter is Netgear Rangemax 240 USB

 

Let's try to assign IP addresses to both computers. You can use the ones that were listed above with the IPCONFIG /ALL print out.

Go to the control panel, networking, change adapter settings (I think that is there for XP, I'm on 7) find your adapter on each computer, right click, go to properties, then click on the TCP/ip4 item, when it's highlighted, go to properties and put the IP address in there with the subnet mask of 255.255.255.0, gateway 192.168.1.1 and the DNS 192.168.1.1

Save changes, reboot, and test both machine. I think we can leave the DHCP on for now.