Windows 7 machine wifi connects but cannot browse the web

[bodminman]

Hi there,

 

I have a laptop on my desk in work at it is refusing to browse the web. It connects to the wap without issue but will not browse the web.

 

When running ipconfig /all, everything looks absolutely fine and the DNS details etc are as they should be and all other laptops and PCs are working fine.

 

When running the troubleshooter I get: The dns server isn't responding.

 

I have done:

Updated the wifi adapter driver (plus all the other drivers on the machine)

netsh winsock reset catalog

netsh int ip reset reset.log

ipconfig /release

ipconfig /flushdns

ipconfig /renew

Run AV and anti malware scans

+ other things I can't remember right now.

 

It will not let me ping anything at all either.

 

If I connect the machine to the LAN via ethernet, it works straight away.

 

Anyone got any suggestions for me to try tomorrow before the things ends up going through a window!

 

Cheers

[mac_shinobi]

First two commands I think by the looks of how you have typed the commands don't look correct ( although I could be wrong however I normally do them as typed below ). Also if win vista or 7 then they need to be run from a command prompt running with elevated rights aka run as admin or run as different user ( right click on command prompt and run as admin or hold shift key and then right click and select run as different user and enter your domain admin credentials and ok to run ( click yes if uac prompts to ask if you want to run as admin etc )

 

Netsh int ip reset

 

And

 

Netsh winsock reset

 

You can put the word catalog afterwards however doing the above commands will work however it just means it wont create a log file. If you do require a log file ensure its done in a directory that you have full access rights to so for example create a new directory on the C:\ drive named 'logs' and the tcp ip reset command would look something like so, obviously you can name the log file anything you want to

 

Netsh int ip reset C:\logs\tcpip.txt

 

Also when you say you updated the drivers for the wireless adaptor

 

1) what make and model of wireless card

 

2) Does the wifi card have any of its own utilities installed to manage the wireless connection instead of using windows? So can you get windows to deal with and manage wireless instead of any included software

 

2a) If its an intel wifi card or broadcom etc, download the latest wifi driver from there site and not the computer manufacturers website first for the correct make and model of wifi card, then remove and delete the driver via device manager, obviously install the latest driver from the network card manufacturers site that you just downloaded ( just the driver only )

 

3) Have you or can you install a different web browser ie firefox or opera and try again ?

 

4) Does the web browser require any proxy or auto config script settings and presume these are being applied on the client correctly - may need to ensure firefox / opera or browser of choice have these configured manually and then test?

 

5) Can you ping the proxy server / default gateway ?

 

6) Does the hosts file have any additional entries or is it default ?

 

7) Reset the windows firewall to default settings to ensure that the windows firewall is not blocking traffic from web browsers. Also what anti virus or anti malware apps are on the pc, again wondering if they are maybe causing issues to browse the web ie integrated firewall or web protection in any additional av software ??

 

Can you disable them temporarily and test to see if that helps, maybe even boot into safe mode with networking and see if you can browse the web

 

I presume other computers can access the internet and browse the web ok

 

If all else fails ensure the wireless card and antennae cables are re seated and try again. If its still the same maybe faulty wireless card

 

You able to test wifi under a linux live disc or maybe time to re image

 

 

Some thoughts..........

Edited June 5, 2014 by mac_shinobi

[mac_shinobi]

@SYNACK @Arthur @seawolf or anyone else have any other ideas or thoughts ?

[bodminman]

This laptop was working fine yesterday. It was shutdown after use and this issue has occurred today after it was started up again.

 

We use Lightspeed here.

 

1) what make and model of wireless card

 

Dell Wireless 1702 802.11 b/g/n - Latest driver installed today

 

2) Does the wifi card have any of its own utilities installed to manage the wireless connection instead of using windows? So can you get windows to deal with and manage wireless instead of any included software

 

No other utility controlling wifi

 

2a) If its an intel wifi card or broadcom etc, download the latest wifi driver from there site and not the computer manufacturers website first for the correct make and model of wifi card, then remove and delete the driver via device manager, obviously install the latest driver from the network card manufacturers site that you just downloaded ( just the driver only )

 

Latest driver installed today and the old one was deleted prior to install

 

3) Have you or can you install a different web browser ie firefox or opera and try again ?

 

Installed Chrome and Firefox and both don't work. IE settings do not have any proxy settings enabled which is correct for our setup.

 

4) Does the web browser require any proxy or auto config script settings and presume these are being applied on the client correctly - may need to ensure firefox / opera or browser of choice have these configured manually and then test?

 

No proxy or auto config

 

5) Can you ping the proxy server / default gateway ?

 

No

 

6) Does the hosts file have any additional entries or is it default ?

 

Default

 

7) Reset the windows firewall to default settings to ensure that the windows firewall is not blocking traffic from web browsers. Also what anti virus or anti malware apps are on the pc, again wondering if they are maybe causing issues to browse the web ie integrated firewall or web protection in any additional av software ??

 

Can you disable them temporarily and test to see if that helps, maybe even boot into safe mode with networking and see if you can browse the web

 

Firewall and AV disabled temporarily and still got no

 

I presume other computers can access the internet and browse the web ok

 

Absolutely fine

 

If all else fails ensure the wireless card and antennae cables are re seated and try again. If its still the same maybe faulty wireless card

 

Checked

 

You able to test wifi under a linux live disc or maybe time to re image

 

Good idea. I shall try this tomorrow if I get the chance

[Arthur]

When you go to the Network and Sharing Center, do you see 'Unidentified Network' next to your wireless connection?

 

Have you already tried the Route Delete command?

[mac_shinobi]

When you go to the Network and Sharing Center, do you see 'Unidentified Network' next to your wireless connection?

 

Have you already tried the Route Delete command?

 

Is that using the metric number of the interface to delete said route ??

[themightymrp]

With you saying it was working before a shutdown, any chance a Windows Update has messed something over? Can you roll back a day or 2?

[HTCPCP]

Have you made any changes to the network at all? The other question to ask would be have you got VLANs at all?

In the mean time have you checked if the machine is registered in DNS if it needs to be on your network?

[mac_shinobi]

Have you made any changes to the network at all? The other question to ask would be have you got VLANs at all?

In the mean time have you checked if the machine is registered in DNS if it needs to be on your network?

 

So either from command prompt running as admin and ipconfig /registerdns or do you mean manually registering said machine in DNS using either an A or CNAME record ?

[jonnykewell1]

Have you tried an nslookup to make sure everything is correct there?

[seawolf]

Since the laptop is receiving an IP address apparently from the DHCP server, are you able to ping it from another computer? If not, then there may be a firewall causing problems on the laptop. If you can ping the laptop from another computer, but can't ping anything from the laptop then you may want to make sure the Lightspeed or your WiFi system isn't somehow isolating the IP or VLAN your laptop is on. I've seen this happen before on Ruckus WiFi as there is a client isolation mode that can be enabled. You should check the iP in Lightspeed as well to make sure it isn't blocking traffic or hasn't placed it in a rogue clients list.

[HTCPCP]

Mac, it's always worth while checking to see if you can see it in DNS before you run the ipconfig /registerdns

[mac_shinobi]

Mac, it's always worth while checking to see if you can see it in DNS before you run the ipconfig /registerdns

 

I was asking above, I didn't say use the registerdns straight off the bat

 

Good point and good to know so thanks

 

If it does not exist in DNS then registerdns from the client or manually create the DNS Record for the client or what exactly ?

[mac_shinobi]

Reset IE settings to defaults, clear all browser history, clear all auto complete history

 

If it is still the same, if you remove IE from the machine ( so control panel --> programs and features --> turn windows features on / off --> un-check the tick box for IE --> ok and let it do that and reboot

 

Log back on and check the tick box again , let it apply the settings and reboot again

 

Log back on and test again

 

If it is still the same issue then I would suggest as per @seawolf 's comment that it may be related to something else but then if it works under a linux live disc then maybe just related to the windows installation on that machine currently

 

If it does not work under linux live disc and doing all the things you have done so far then it must be lightspeed or something else that may be effecting it

 

Presume you are logging on with an AD account that has internet access allowed via security groups / proxy server etc so they are not in a blocked ACL and DHCP is not giving the laptop an ip address or ip address range that will not route externally or to the internet etc ?

 

Is it a transparent proxy so clients dont require any proxy info ie ip address or pac file etc

 

Out of curiousty if you use the proxy servers ip address in the proxy settings on port 80 or 8080 does that allow it to browse the web or is that still the same

 

Is the MAC Address of the wireless card in your lightspeed / proxy server or any firewall to block it ??

 

Only other thing that springs to mind is I remember someone else having an issue where by the firewall was mis-configured and needed the subnet mask updating so that it encapsulated the whole network as previously they had the wrong subnet mask configured and the firewall did not work with all clients, if it got a certain ip address on the client then they couldn't browse the internet etc

 

Just guessing here with regards to the above suggestions etc

Edited June 6, 2014 by mac_shinobi

[SYNACK]

Have you tried completely removing the AV and rebooting, some - eset - can and will happily kill all network traffic if they get provoked and need to be uninstalled entirely then put back on.

[Michael]

I've read most of this thread and it looks like a firewall issue to me (on the client).

 

Does Safe Mode with Networking allow you to surf?

 

I've also seen weird quirks with the Windows Firewall (especially on XP), in that you need to restore its configuration to default, irrelevant if it's enabled or disabled.

[HTCPCP]

I was asking above, I didn't say use the registerdns straight off the bat

 

Good point and good to know so thanks

 

If it does not exist in DNS then registerdns from the client or manually create the DNS Record for the client or what exactly ?

 

When one of our machines dropped off DNS, we opened up CMD through "run as administrator" on the client. That worked for us so we didn't have to worry about going any further down that road.

[abillybob]

I'm having this issue did you find out what was causing it? One laptop on the network is connected to the Wi-Fi but says "Unidentified Network" and even though has a valid IP Address, DNS Server IP, Router IP, it just can't access the internet or ping anything in the school meaning children can't login on it.

 

Grrrrr anyone know what else I can do to hopefully resolve this? It's a freshly imaged laptop and so are all the others around the school but they're not having this problem!!!???

[Muz]

This can be a sign of WIFI problems, e.g interference or AP capacity issues.

[Michael]

I'm having this issue did you find out what was causing it? One laptop on the network is connected to the Wi-Fi but says "Unidentified Network" and even though has a valid IP Address, DNS Server IP, Router IP, it just can't access the internet or ping anything in the school meaning children can't login on it.

 

Grrrrr anyone know what else I can do to hopefully resolve this? It's a freshly imaged laptop and so are all the others around the school but they're not having this problem!!!???

 

Try updating the drivers on the client.

[cooka]

Check certificates?

Connect to the WAP, Run MMC and add Certificates, then personal certs, make sure that none have expired? Delete any that have, run a gpupdate and restart.

[abillybob]

This can be a sign of WIFI problems, e.g interference or AP capacity issues.

 

It's a managed wi-fi system and the people who manage it won't give me access to the dahboard of our wifi AP's so I wouldn't be able to tell, we do have a lot of wireless devices in the school though so I suppose it's a possibility?

 

Try updating the drivers on the client.

 

Tried this and it made no difference

 

Check certificates?

Connect to the WAP, Run MMC and add Certificates, then personal certs, make sure that none have expired? Delete any that have, run a gpupdate and restart.

 

Sorry to sound like a noob but none of this made sense to me, how would I go about doing this?

[Muz]

Check certificates?

Connect to the WAP, Run MMC and add Certificates, then personal certs, make sure that none have expired? Delete any that have, run a gpupdate and restart.

Would that not only apply if using 802.1x?

[mac_shinobi]

I've read most of this thread and it looks like a firewall issue to me (on the client).

 

 

Reset the windows firewall to defaults either through control panel --> windows firewall --> restore defaults link ( left side ) --> click restore defaults button and click yes

 

OR

 

Control panel --> Windows Firewall --> Advanced settings link ( left side ) --> Action menu at the top --> Restore Default Policy and click yes

 

Presumably when you say you removed the wireless driver, you ticked the tick box to delete all the drivers relating to it so that when you reboot it only shows up in device manager as an ethernet controller or network device or similar and then re install the driver only after restarting / rebooting windows and logging back in to obviously re install the latest driver(s) for said wifi card.

 

Also as synack suggested ref removing and re installing any AV as I know some if not most AV products now have there own in built firewall ( to a degree ) presuming the resetting of the windows firewall does not help

Edited December 15, 2014 by mac_shinobi

[cooka]

Would that not only apply if using 802.1x?

To be honest, i'm not sure Muz. I know we have had cert issues and this was a fix that worked for us.

 

If you go to start - run (or windows key + R) and type MMC.

A box should appear. Click File, then Add & Remove snap in.

Select Certificates in the list, then Add, then OK.

In the tree, expand Certificates, look under then folder Personal.

 

No entirely sure it will help but worth a shot. Also, ensure that the Time and Date are correct on the laptop

 

If all else fails, could you not uninstall any AV software / disable windows firewall completely to eliminate that from the cause?

Edited December 15, 2014 by cooka