Off topic, internet connection

[ss]

I know its not strictly DIY but wondering if anyone can help, on my wifes laptop she has suddenly lost everything to do with the internet connection. The main PC uses Virgin and she uses a wireless connection from that. The icons at the bottom right of the screen have gone, I would normally click on there and then click repair but cant find them anymore, I have tried in control panel but nothing I can see in there other than some sort of wizard for a new connection. I dont have a clue at this end of computing (son set it up) tried system restore but that aint working (getting someone to look at that for me) I did run a scan and it came up with Module C:\windows\System32\Drivers\dxgTHK,sys **suspicious** which means jot all to me.

Any help would be good

[The Natural Philosopher]

its supposed to be a direct X video driver. Googling reveals that it MAY be compromised.

it should be small - about 1.4k in size.

But its unlikely that malware kicks you OFF line.

go back to a wired connection and see what still works - if that comes up then you know the wireless is gone pear shaped.

I had this problem till I discovered a button on the laptop that totally disables wireless :-)

[John Rumm]

Do the obvious one first, check to see if the laptop has a hard or a keyboard combination switch to turn wireless off. With wireless disabled, some of the normal wireless controls will vanish.

In theory its part of Microsoft DirectX, so usually not worth worrying about.

[Tim Downie]

+1

If there's not an "antenna" switch, you may find that the function keys can toggle the wi-fi function on and off. Look for a key with a crows foot like symbol.

Tim

[ss]

I found the key but it makes no difference.

[Brian Gaff]

/Seems a strange way to do things these days. Normally one would use a router and the laptop would connect directly via wireless, and maybe the main pc by cable to a port on the router. Often if a new connection has popped up locally the wireless gets lost. Be interesting to see what the wireless connection says is available. Brian

[Mentalguy2k8]

It may be a key *combination* (eg hold down the FN key AND the wireless symbol key), but as long as there isn't a physical switch that's turned off, try:

Open up Device Manager - In XP I think you go to control panel, Performance & Maintenance, system, device manager

You'll see a list of hardware in your laptop, click the little + next to "Network adapters" (if the tree isn't already open), identify your WiFi adapter, right-click it and if "enable" is select-able, then select it. Otherwise, select "properties" and it should tell you if your wifi card is working and if not, why not.

If you have no joy there, then right-click your network card again, select "uninstall" and reboot. This should re-install your wifi card and enable it (don't panic, it should be automatic), and we can take it from there.

[Graham.]

If it's a laptop keyboard you usually have to hold down the function (Fn) key first.

[Graham.]

This is possible I suppose using bridged network connections and ICS, but are you sure that your main PC even needs to be switched on in order to use the Internet wirelessly from your laptop?

[dennis]

At one time, and maybe now, virgin only allowed one MAC address to access the internet. If you changed PCs you had to power down the cable modem so it relearned the MAC address. This may or may not be an issue.

BTW the button on some virgin cable modems didn't turn them off and hence did not reset the MAC. It only turned the indicator lights off.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

That would be a sure way to keep or win new customers. ;-) I've had broadband for a long time and never had that restriction.

[Mentalguy2k8]

It came about because back then, you had to connect a PC directly to the Virgin modem to set up & activate your account, and technically only that PC's MAC address could go online. I say "technically" because you would subsequently plug a router into the modem instead, and set up the router to give the modem whatever MAC address you chose - a single click would "clone" your PC's MAC address onto the router. By making the modem think it was still connected to the PC rather than the router, you could connect as many machines via cable or wifi to the router and they'd all have net access.

I do remember in the early dial-up days before routers were common, if you wanted 2 PCs to share a net connection, you had to get one connected, then run an ethernet cable from that PC to the next and set up Internet Sharing and all kinds of buggering around.

[djc]

There was something like that restriction with the original Blueyonder cable service (circa 2002). You were allowed up to five MAC addresses which had to be entered into an online form. The MAC for the cable modem itself had to be phoned through to them to set up the initial connection.

[dennis]

That restriction went quite a while before the one I was talking about.