Re: Wireless access problems with Vista

2008-04-02T19:25:17Z

In my experience of working with wireless there are usually options in the wireless router itself that allow you to set the method in which IP addresses are distributed (usually through a protocol called DHCP (Dynamic Host Control Protocol) that gives the computer an IP address upon connection to the wireless network. And usually along with the IP address information, you usually get assigned the DNS server IP addresses that the computer should use. The Domain Name Servers (DNS) take website names (i.e. www.cnn.com) and "translate" them into IP addresses so that the computers can communicate in numbers since that is what they speak.

If for some reason the Vista computers are not accepting the DNS server addresses from the wireless router, then that could be the problem. In past versions of Windows you could look at the IP address configuration by opening the command prompt window and typing "ipconfig /all" (without the quotes). This would show you the current IP address and DNS server address. If there is no DNS server address, then you will definitely not see any web sites.

The ping utility that your patron uses is able to test to see whether there is an active connection between two points on the network. You can also use another utility called traceroute (for trace route) that, yep, traces the route of your data packets from your computer to its destination. If it does not reach its destination, then it gives you an error message.

Here is a handout with screen shots that shows you how to use traceroute on Windows Vista:

http://www.qwest.com/internethelp/opsystems/pdf/16019_Vista_TraceRoute.pdf

I have a Linksys wireless router at home and have hooked two Vista Home Premium systems to it with wireless cards and did not have to do anything different in my recollection from the Windows XP machines to get it to work, but with all the additional security that Vista has versus XP, it might be possible that there are settings that you have to adjust in the wireless configuration to get it to accept the DNS addresses automatically, but everything I have read so far does not lead me to believe that is the case here.

I would attempt to compare the out put of the "ipconfig /all" command on a working XP machine that you have and a non-working Vista machine the next time that someone comes in. This would help pinpoint if there are any differences between the two setups.

Here are some directions with screen shots that show how to set up the networking in Vista to accept the IP and DNS addresses automatically:

http://www.svwireless.com/Support/linksys_VistaPC.html

Hope this helped at least a little bit....

Wireless access problems with Vista

2008-04-02T14:09:02Z

I apologize ahead of time if my question seems naive or stupid, but I'm fairly uninformed about wireless/networking. We have wireless via our local cable company in our small library system.

Patrons have begun coming in with new Vista computers. Many (perhaps all?) are having great trouble connecting to our wireless. Some can not get logged in (this is usually a popup issue and I've figured out how to get around it), but others seem able to log in fine. (Patrons are issued username and password on a per-session basis at the circ desk). However, once logged in, they are unable to get any web page to load.

One fairly savvy patron told me that he had pinged the server and was not getting domain name resolution. Does this sound like a problem with the WIRELESS, or a problem with the VISTA computer?

I've had other patrons come in at other times with older XP computers and have no problems connecting... so I'm baffled. My Mac (OSX) also has no problem connecting.

Any suggestions?