winsock 2.0

My Inspiron laptop has lost all connection with the internet, which is through a BT ADSL router.

 

NOw when restarting my PC I get the message "You need to have Winsock version 2.0 on your computer. Please refer to the users manual -> Introduction -> System Requirments section on information on how to download and install Winsock 2.0", not so helpful as I can't get online to download. At the same time I also get the Netowork Diagnostics for Windows XP message " Windows has detected a problem with the Winsock provider catalog on this computer. This catalog allows programs to communicate with this computer across the network. Would you like Windows to rest the catalog to the default configuration? This computer might need to be restarted to restore network connectivity". I choose "Yes" and restart the PC, but again get the same issue. I see when checnking the diagnostic log that I have Error 12159 "the TCP/IP protocol is not installed properly". Looked this up also on MS and only found the decription of the error and no details of how to fix it.

 

Can someone please help me, how can I resolve this problem?

 

Thanks heaps in advance