'Little or connectivity'

Question

I have a home wired network which runs fine with a built computer, a Dell laptop and a Sony laptop. We have just received two new Dell laptops Latitude D420 (from work) and Inspiron 1300 (for home) which will not talk to the network. The network is connected by a 4 port ethernet Conexant chipset ADSL modem router to the BT telephone system.

Both get the same error message when the network cable is plugged in. "Trying to find network address" and "limited or no connectivity."

When I check route print, network destination of both is
127.0.0.0
169.254.0.0
....

Neither have IP routing or WINS enabled (nor have the computers that connect properly)
The computer that works has network destination of
0.0.0.0
10.0.0.0
10.0.0.10
...
default gateway 10.0.0.2

There is probably a switch somewhere to change.

Any ideas?

fireberd · Answer

Do the new PC's work if you connect them directly to the modem and bypass the router?    Sometimes when you connect new devices, you have to reset (repower) the router to get it to recognize the new device.

Marlborough Hope · Answer

Thanks fireberd

1. The modem and router are one unit, so I cannot by-pass the router.

2. I have tried switching the computers and modem off and on in various combinations but the result is the same.

Do Dell systems set up factory network settings different from other manufacturers? Is there a Windows (or other) diagnosis tool which reports all the network related settings? I can then check the differences between the 3 computers that work well on my router and the 2 Dell ones that do not!

fireberd · Answer

There's nothing different that I know of in Dell's - just standard Windows XP setups.

jmwills · Answer

Try giving them a static IP Address within the scope set forth by that router and see what happens.

Marlborough Hope · Answer

Thanks- but that did not work!   Presumably somewhere in the XP network setup procedure are switches telling the procedure what to try and what to assume.  The switches seem to be scattered in Control Panel -> Network Connections, IE -> LAN Connections (and variously in Opera and Firefox) and presumably elsewhere.  The existing computers on my home network have obviously been set correctly (at least they work to get the IP address dynamically allocated) , but the new Dell's have not.  I can see no difference between the settings on the two sets of computers.    Is there one place where they are all listed and can be set?

Networking, Internet, & Bluetooth

"Little or connectivity"

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