My girlfriend's Toshiba laptop can't connect to the internet. The other computers here have no problem, we just plug in and we are fine. The other PCs are XPs and Macs, hers is Vista. Also her Vista is in Japanese and because I've never used Vista in English, basic tasks are taking me a long time.

I wasn't sure whether to post this in the Vista forum or the Internet/Networking forum but because I'm putting up screen shots from Vista and need help navigating it, I've put the post here.

I got some help before and

-disabled the DHCP Broadcast Flag for all the network adapters on the system
-disabled IPv6 on all network adapters
-disabled the IPHelper service in services.msc

This seemed to give us a temporary fix as we were briefly able to connect when we plugged in at an internet shop in the small city near here. But when we got back out to our school it didn't work.

We have a satellite connection(sorry this is vague but I live at a school in Thailand) and until now no one has had a problem plugging in an ethernet cable and connecting before.

ALSO, I used Microsoft's Internet Connectivity Evaluation Tool from my PC and they said that this place/router is Vista friendly.


I've taken some screen shots to show a little more of where we're at. I wish her Vista wasn't in Japanese(and that she knew some computer terms, but she's doing her best with her dictionary to translate). I think that Vista users will know the windows in these screenshots and might see something that I'm missing...

So again, any other computer that uses this same ethernet cable can connect but not hers. On this network and on my own PC which I'm using now, if I do an IPConfig I get
Connection-specific DNS Suffix:
IP Address:10.133.82.21
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.240
Default Gateway:10.133.82.17

Looking at the details from her PC below(4th picture), does it matter that her Subnet Mask is different from mine? Hers is 255.255.0.0


This first picture is the 'network and share center.' I've never used Vista in English so this is totally new to me.


Local Area Connection status



Properties


Details




On the 'network and share center' window, if I click that red X between the network connection and the globe this is the help window that comes up. There are 3 options that it gives us, roughly translated they are:

1-"if you click here, we will help you find how to find a wireless network"
2-"network adapter 'local area connection' get new IP setting automatically"
3-"the network router or broadband modem that you are using has a problem. maybe that's why you cant connect.
if you connect with a home network, you should turn off the modem and pull out the cord, wait 10 seconds, plug
the cord back in and turn it on again.
make sure the modem is connected from the cable jack or modual jack from the wall. then try to connect to
the network again."

here's that picture



I chose option 2, 'get a new IP setting automatically' and after a minute it said
"Network Diagnosis
We could not find anything.
Contact network manager or service provider."


She used this in Japan for about a year and had an ISP that required at username and password, so there might still be some configuration set up for that.

Anything obvious that we are missing here? Shouldn't Vista pcs be able to plug right in and use the internet?


thanks for any help!

Welcome to PCHF,

Since I can't read your Japanese characters, I'll give you a general concept suggestion.

Open your Device Manager.
Click on View ... Show hidden devices

Click on and Delete (with the Delete key) any devices that have a ? or ! in front of them.
If the Device Manager has an "Other" device category, open it and Delete any devices in the "Other" category.
Now, reboot.

The reboot will force Windows to refind the deleted devices and hopefully see them for what they are.
After rebooting, give Windows time to locate and properly install the deleted devices.

Go to the Device Manager and verify that all your devices are listed correctly.

Good Luck...

Thanks so much Gandalf for your amazingly quick reply! We found the Device Manager but there weren't any "?"s or "!"s. Here's a screen shot. Any other ideas? Thanks again!

Your snapshot didn't make it.
Try this approach...

To attach files to a reply, look under the Message text window, you'll see a button that says Manage Attachments.
Click on the button. Now click on the browse button and browse to the file you wish to attach.

thanks again

Attached Images

devices1.jpg (79.4 KB, 3 views)

I may have missed something in your write-up. So these may be dumb questions.

You said...

This seemed to give us a temporary fix as we were briefly able to connect when we plugged in at an internet shop in the small city near here. But when we got back out to our school it didn't work.

1. Were you connecting at the internet shop via a hardwire ethernet connection or wireless?

2. At your school, are you trying to connect via ethernet connection or wireless?

Sorry to take a few days, we were away for the weekend. No stupid questions here, I was vague before but didn't want to write too much.

In both cases it was hard wire, which is what really flips my switches...