[Resolved] New install. No internet access.

[Hartismere]

Hello,

I have just installed Windows 7, 64-bit. Clean install, not an upgrade. I cannot now get online via the wireless router. No problem with previous Operating System - XP.

I have searched the net for advice, but nothing has worked. I still get, "Unidentified network", "No internet access", "No network access", and "the connection was unsuccesfull" notifications. I have tried everything that other users suggest worked for them, but nothing works for me.

In case you are wondering, I'm typing this and entering this forum using an old XP laptop which is happily wirelessly accessing the same connection that I can't on my desktop system.

I have not installed any programs. I am working just with this clean install of the OS, so all of the "solutions" that involved removing files or stopping processes installed by other programs were irrelevant, and nothing else has proven effective.

Left alone, the Realtek RTL8185 Wireless LAN Utility is displaying my IP Address as 169.254.167.136. This is not correct. It also lists the Gateway as 0.0.0.0, which is also clearly wrong. I have changed the IP Address and related settings to the correct ones in the TCPIPv4 section of the Windows "Connection Properties", and used the Google DNS settings; 8.8.8.8, and 8.8.4.4, and although the the Realtek "utility" will now show the correct IP details, the connection still fails.

There is no way of changing anything using the Realtek Config Utility. It offers just one and one only interactive button, "ReNew IP", but that just wipes the addresses for a second or two and then re-displays them exactly the same as before. Not much of a utility, really; just a supplier of information - mostly incorrect.

Despite being unable to get online, when I hover the mouse-pointer over the Realtek bar graph icon in the Tray, it tells me that the Realtek Wireless LAN is connected to {my connection}. Curiously, though, even though it is telling me it is connected, and while the "utility" offers me signal strength and link quality bar graphs, it will not let me access the router from a browser (IE), which I have done on several occasions prior to Win 7, and can swiftly do from this old XP laptop.

The Windows Troubleshooting bits have not been very helpful, simply offering, "Wireless Network Connection does not have a valid IP Address" - before I changed it.

I have reset something using CMD\reset winsock something something, following online advice. This worked inasmuch as the reset command was successfully executed - it told me so, but a reboot revealed the same nonsense.

When I first used this PCI WLAN (PCI is the motherboard's BUS slot, WLAN means Wireless Local Area Network) card about 18 months ago, I installed everything - drivers and utility. However, I never once got online using the Realtek (then XP) Config Utility. I always had to navigate to a Windows tick box to Allow Windows to manage the wireless connection - can't remember the exact path and texts. Eventually, the Windows-manage Tick box remained ticked, and I stopped the Realtek prog from loading, and remained happily online - until now. It appears that that particular, useful little Windows facility is not available in 7 - at least I can't find it. I did try disallowing the current (Win 7) Realtek prog from starting up, but that just blanked everything to do with internet access, though as a newbie to 7, I might have missed something. Is there a way to let Windows manage the connection?

Control Panel\System\Device Manager\Network Devices is showing two entries;

1. NVIDIA nForce Networking Controller

2. Realtek 8185 Extensible 802.11b/g Wireless Device

1. Not sure that this appeared in the XP installation. But, just not sure. Can only prove by reinstalling XP. But that's looking very likely, anyway. I have disabled it. Makes no difference.

2. Absolutely certain that this is different. The XP installation offered information here by card manufacturer not by driver manufacturer, and appeared as "Micronet SP906GKxx...". No mention of Realtek. I downoaded the Windows 7 driver from the Micronet site, not the Realtek site. I have also uninstalled both of these and let Windows find them and reinstall them. Nada.

I've trawled every information section offered by Windows, and there is nowhere any mention of the actual card, and CMD\ipconfig lists every instance of any "adapter" as "Media disconnected".

Drivers up-to-date. Card well-seated. Connections secure. Have removed and reinstalled the card twice.

Any ideas hugely appreciated.

Many thanks.

(To add insult to injury... A new icon just appeared in the tray - hovering over it produced "Solve PC issues: 1 important message". I clicked it and it said, "Find an antivirus program online (important)"... Would that I could.)

[Tripredacus]

How does the device show up in Device Manager?

Have you checked the DHCP logs on your router to see if the MAC Address for the WNIC shows up there?

[ExTruckie]

Several things come to mind while reading your post.

1 The ip address is a local address assigned by windows when it can not obtain an ip address from an other source, router.

2 Can you hook up to the router via a cable and if so do you get an ip address from the router? If you haven't tried that do so.

[cannie]

....I have searched the net for advice, but nothing has worked....

Hi Hartismere:

Have you tried to download updated network drivers from the motherboard manufacturer?

If they don't exist you may install the same Windows 7 version using the 32 bits working mode. Compatibility is almost complete with XP device drivers and you will notice no difference at all unless your computer memory is bigger than 4 GB.

Good luck!

Edited March 8, 2011 by cannie

[Hartismere]

Hello, peeps, and thanks for responses.

Bit embarrassing this but...

It appears that the Win7 driver on the Micronet site might be for a PCIE card and not PCI. I have absolutely no idea why this should be relevant. I would have thought the driver would write the specifics and then use system calls to affect the different bus architecture, surely that's what an Operating System is there for - to make things easier? . Anyway, this aspect is not yet confirmed, I am waiting for a further response from Micronet. But surely you'd reasonably expect a different bus device to be given a slightly modified name - just stick an E on the end perhaps, or change the appended v. Whatever, there was absolutely no way of knowing that this was for a different card bus, until installation.

Even more interesting, though...

After failing to install the card in 7 I reinstalled XP - just to be able to search for information and advice. In the meantime a gentleman from Micronet had replied to my intitial enquiry about 64-bit compatibility saying it would be fine with 64-bit, but the he added:

"In addition, Windows 7 should have

> the necessary drivers built-in for this chipset already, so it should work

> without any problems."

This is odd. Why would they write a new driver for a PCIE card and not for a PCI card? Hope he replies. So, if he is correct and the system does indeed have the drivers for that chipset, where are they, and how can I use them? (He's right in one respect at least, the card is 2005, and so I would expect that the chipset had been recognised and the drivers absorbed. (Would my refusal to allow updates affect this? See Automatic Updates always start immediately. When I turn on the computer, I do so to do something Immediately, and I don't want anything to to waste hours, or even minutes, downloading and installing. If these things waited until the mouse and keyboard had been idle for ten to fifteen minutes I would go with it. I only ever do updates when I've done what I switched on to do, and am now going to make tea. or de-flea the cat.))

Someone elsewhere directed me to Realtek's site where there are drivers for Win 7 but none of the text files give any indication if they are suitable for 64-bit or for PCI. I see Win7 and I see x64\x86, but no indication of difference OS or card bus. Looks like I'm going to have to experiment a bit. (Hopefully, one of you very nice, and very special geniuses will supply an answer beforehand. If you don't, of course, your name will be mud.)

In answer to your appreciated responses - but, remember, my whole starting point might be spurious if the driver is only for a PCIE card...also, I'm now running XP again, and can't check 7 easily.

cannie.

1. NO, the motherboard is not involved. This is a separate PCI WLAN adapter. I did, though, go straight to the Card Manufacturer's site and downloaded from there. I am always reluctant to go to the Driver manufacturer's site as we consistently get dire warnings about doing that - they are generic and can cause more problems than they solve, etc.

2. That's the reason I went for 64-bit. I want all my memory to be recognised (4 Gig system, 1 Gig Graphics, (2 Gig Swapfile and 2 Gig Thingy boost on a 4 Gig SD card). (Good Idea??)

ExTruckie.

Take your word for that. Clearly something not happy. It is very wrong.

Can't do a cable hook up. Geography all wrong. Would involve moving my entire system to another part of the house, and I need to connect wirelessly from where I am, so I either solve this or go back to XP. No other choices exist.

Tripredacus.

1. As I said, it shows up as a Realtek device and not a Micronet device - which I with my limited experience find odd, but it insists that all is fine - Working properly, no conflicts.

2. DCHP. I definitely recall that it told me that DCHP was not installed\selected\working properly, or something. The DCHP bit was not OK. But, if I had been given some choice to affect that and make it better I would have experimented and changed tons of stuff. But all was not well there at the DCHP.

As I say, I'm hoping the guy from Micronet gets back to me, so I expect no further responses until I resume. Any input is welcome, obviously, but you may well be wasting your time answering my first post- (PCI or PCIE card), and I don't want to do that to you.

There is a driver for the chipset on the Realtek site which says it's for XP/VISTA/7. I've looked at the various text files contained in the zip file, and Win7 is mentioned, but I want to wait a bit until some advice comes back a lot clearer - it's a slow install, is 7 for some reason - XP takes seconds. But I do appreciate your taking the time to bother.

Incidentally, there is absolutely tons of stuff online elsewhere about wireless probs with 7, but surprisingly very little on MSFN.

Thanks muchly,

H.

[Hartismere]

Hello peeps.

Have tried the drivers from the Realtek site. They worked in a very, very, very,very,very sloooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow way slow way. So slow that I got kicked out of everything due to Timeouts, and, further, they only worked when there was a cloud in the sky. Rubbish. Total crap.

So I have made a decision. Despite spending money, again to line the pockets of the multi-billionaire Gates - who is giving money to charities, but whose rubbish systems do not flipping work,and that is where ho should be spending his money, I'm dissing Windows 7. It is rubbish. Total rubbish, and I am now and evermore doing XP. Because in XP things WORK. Nothing in either Vista or 7 works. FACT!

I thank you greatly for your time, but your time would have been better spent lobbying the scumbag Gates to make his rubbish systems WORK!

I've got a winbdbobwbs - it's rubbish - wbibnbs 7 disk for sale. Anyone want to buy something that DOESN'T WORK? Unlikely.

Windows 7 meet Windows Vista -you are SO alike. You both don't work!!!

[Sl@y3D for my n@me]

I honestly can't understand why you think so harshly of Windows 7 when the problem lies in the drivers, and your particular configuration. I personally hate it when people say "oh well, I've had no problems with it, so it's perfect and the rest is your fault!", but even so, it seems you just cut and run too quickly.

I will add that no matter what you look up, several thousand people will have had problems with it. You'll probably find the same sort of reports about xp. I had blue screen problems with Windows XP which were related to the drivers. If you genuinely have spent money on Windows 7, I would really recommend doing more research into this particular problem. There is no point in wasting your money and depriving yourself of the stuff Windows 7 has to offer.

[jcgriff2]

I agree.

I was fond of Vista; never had any problems. Windows 7 is very much like Vista given they both are NT6x builds; however, Windows 7 does run leaner, faster.

Did you run the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor ?

http://www.microsoft...de-advisor.aspx

Regards. . .

jcgriff2

`

[cluberti]

Windows 7 meet Windows Vista -you are SO alike. You both don't work!!!

Both work fine. You happen to use substandard networking components (Micronet SP906GK devices are modified and re-branded Realtek 8185 devices) which don't work properly with the drivers provided (they make drivers for this device for Win9x - the chipset is considerably old). If you were to google Realtek 8185 and Windows 7 together, you'd find you are hardly the first that has significant troubles getting this to work in Windows 7 (and some folks had trouble under Vista as well with older revs of this chipset, it seems). Also, it appears that vendors can modify the Realtek chipset, and certain vendors seem to have more devices that work versus some others (Micronet, Zyxel) that do not. So, it would also seem that these are indeed Realtek 8185 devices, but they've been modified as such by the OEM reselling them (in your case, Micronet) which has caused them to work far worse than other vendor's devices using the same Realtek chipset. Again and as others have said, this is not Microsoft's fault, nor Bill Gates (he doesn't even work there anymore, and really hasn't since the middle of the last decade). I am sorry to hear that you are having issues with your network card under Windows 7 (and you should use what works for you), but your blind hatred of Microsoft is quite obvious, and has led you to place the blame where it does not belong. In the future, you may wish to consider purchasing devices from name-brand vendors rather than knock-off clones, which will probably reduce your frustration level and driver issues, for starters.

Given this issue is resolved, I'm marking this thread as such in the title.