Thank you for being a valued part of the CNET community. As of December 1, 2020, the forums are in read-only format. In early 2021, CNET Forums will no longer be available. We are grateful for the participation and advice you have provided to one another over the years.

Thanks,

CNET Support

Resolved Question

Connected to network and Internet. Still no loading anything

Mar 31, 2015 2:07AM PDT

Hi everyone and thank you in advance for any input you can give me. For about 4 days now I've had the worst Internet experiences, this only occurs to my computer and there haven't been any changing variables I know of since it was working to it not working. Randomly at late one night a game I usually play disconnected me from the server. It happens with the game sometimes I just restarted steam as usual and the issue persisted for a while. It let me connect for a short time but as time went on it wouldn't connect at all. I went to check other Web pages and it would either be incredibly slow, or just stuck in an infinite loading screen.(sometimes up to a half hour. Then it would return to its normal style and be fine for a minute or two then it would repeat. No matter what I have done. The issue persists.

I have ruled out the router as every other device in the house works fine, even while in the same location as the affected computer. Originally I was getting troubleshooter messages saying it was a dns issue. I looked into all of the fixes to this and applied them. When I run ipconfig /all everything looks fine aside from a tunnel adapter saying "dhcp enabled: no" but I assure you I have it set to "obtain dns server address automatically"(I also tried to set several different manual open dns's to attempt a fix) even so flushed, released, and renewed my it from cmd as administrator. I searched for mallard, viruses, etc. With kaspersky 2015 and found nothing. I tried shutting down my firewall to see if that was blocking it to no avail. I ran the netsh commands. After all of that I thought maybe my anti-virus wasn't picking something up so I reformatted my main sdd(my slave only has movie,game, and picture files on it) and after reinstalling windows 7 and my drivers the problem is still there. I don't know what else it could be. Please help. Typing this on my phone took forever.

Discussion is locked

svenEsven has chosen the best answer to their question. View answer

Best Answer

- Collapse -
No pc details? Going to be rough.
Mar 31, 2015 2:15AM PDT

I'd try a new Ethernet or WiFi adapter AFTER a test with a Live CD.

For my Live CD/DVD/USB test I like Puppy Linux, Linux Mint and others. This way I can sniff out if it is hardware or some OS/driver issue.
Bob

- Collapse -
Sorry I left out my pc specs
Mar 31, 2015 2:29AM PDT

Running Windows 7, and I assume the only hardware you really need is what I'm using to connect to the Internet. I use a realtek rtl8191su wireless lan dongle. Which works fine when I run the tether on my phone.

- Collapse -
Since it tethers fine.
Mar 31, 2015 2:36AM PDT
- Collapse -
Answer
Forgot a thing or two
Mar 31, 2015 2:21AM PDT

I also ruled out that it's my wifi dongle, because i can tether to my phone just fine and the internet runs fine on it. Since trying today it does after a certain amount of time of being pseudo offline it does tell me there is no internet access but it again only happens to this device.I also checked the wouter setting to make sure it wasnt blocking me in any way and it says everything is allowed the same access. I am running windows 7 on a 3 year old custom build pc. I will post all the info i gained from ipconfig /all if it will help.

- Collapse -
So it's WiFi?
Mar 31, 2015 2:27AM PDT

Drop the distance to the router to 25 feet, line of sight for testing.

- Collapse -
success for now
Mar 31, 2015 2:45AM PDT

While sitting it directly next to my router it does seem to be holding a connection, this is odd to me though considering it worked fine in the exact setup when i moved in here and the 2 months that followed. and my signal strength in my room always shows that i'm at 98% or higher when i'm up there, it just cut out. I suppose ill take the pc back upstairs and if it persists ill just have to relocate my router.

- Collapse -
Time to use that WiFi analyzer.
Mar 31, 2015 2:52AM PDT

You may find it's time to change WiFi channels on the router.

- Collapse -
Appreciated
Mar 31, 2015 2:54AM PDT

Thanks I'll look up a guide on how to do this. I appreciate your time.

- Collapse -
Here's my attempt on such a guide.
Mar 31, 2015 3:01AM PDT

Pull up the screen that looks like this one:
https://lh4.ggpht.com/2yVUnQuDeh5u4yoYEM7UGM_itfO3fUxMGRM7SpqMvx8jkL1mSGVIOZ99C3tHXY1TbkY_=h900

Hopefully it's not as crowded as that since that one is so crowded I'd be guessing it's time to move to the 5GHz band.

Hopefully your home WiFi is closer to this:
https://lh5.ggpht.com/TU-HX4NPq5GLdOY8KNVtw3tRWFTOWTsafpWzxJCwdZckpKlNQL27Dqr47rdefDNxhw=h900

But avoid channels 1 and 14 in the USA. There are tomes about why so I'll not repeat that.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_WLAN_channels is a primer on channels and why 802.11n has only one non-overlapping channel in its 40MHz OFDM (mode.)

Getting a view of the WiFi layout could help.
Bob

- Collapse -
No bueno
Mar 31, 2015 3:21AM PDT

I've tried 5 separate channels now, they all work great when I first connect to them. Then they do the same thing as before. Maybe I'll have to relocate my router. Are there any restrictions to which cable outlet I can use?

- Collapse -
Sorry
Mar 31, 2015 3:27AM PDT

I don't know how your house is wired, etc.

- Collapse -
Answer
We had a similar happening here
Mar 31, 2015 3:39AM PDT

Turned out not to be router nor USB wifi device related. It was the PSU giving voltage fluctuations. It burned up 3 cheap USB wifi devices on the computer before I figured it out. I would advise putting a volt meter direct to a molex fitting from the PSU and watch it for awhile, from a cold start. The fluctuation (from 12 to 24 volts) we had was in the first few minutes and then would settle down. A molex has 2 black, one yellow and one red wire. The black are ground and you can use the positive on the meter on either the red or yellow, one rated for 5V, which is the same for USB devices and the other the 12V. If that proves OK, then next check the USB port voltage itself. Pinout available on internet, but the power is on each side and the middle contacts are data.

- Collapse -
Answer
Can you share the exact model of the WiFi dongle?
Mar 31, 2015 3:41AM PDT

Here my "Nano TP-Link TL-WN725N" is nice and compact but gives me about half the range of a ALFA AWUS036H.
Bob