I have having an in IT chaos!

There are a couple of issues that are doing my head in. If anyone can shout in some advice that is great.

Number one- There is a little bit of hardwear poking out the bottom of my laptop. I took it to PC World today, stood for ages in the PC clinic before the guy told me that there was no dogs allowed, so I have to put Princess in the car before coming back and showing him the problem. He said that they did not have any screws to attach the bits in again. That sounds like grade A horse manure. Why would a computer shop not have computer screws. He said he had not idea where I would find screws of the right size.

Number two- After the house rabbit chewed through my modem (and the charger for the bluetooth and mobile) I thought I ought to go wireless. So I bought a wireless box thing. I plugged all the bits in, and the computer was able to connect to the wireless. But for its own reasons it will only work offline.

It is a wireless modem router isn't it? If it's just a wireless router you would need a modem in addition to make it work.

Assuming it is a wireless modem router, has it been configured correctly? I take it you are using a wireless adapter for your laptop via USB? Has the router been set up properly according to your ISP's instructions? Most routers can be configured automatically but it depends on your ISP settings.

Oh and the hardware problem, piccy?

Yes it is a wireless router. I thought it had a modem included with it.

The computer can see/feel/hear the wireless - it just insists on being offline

What's the make/model?

Emily, please don't echo the behaviour of another forum member who threw his dongle out of window in temper, shocking behaviour

Make, model, ISP and what wireless card do you have.

Ta

Okay, it is a BELKIN ASDL modem with Wireless G router.

My laptop has wireless bult in.

Is this the one?

What's the inbuilt wireless card on your laptop?

As cheeze said, who's your ISP? How have you configured your internet settings and wireless settings?

Did you configure the router wirelessly or via USB/Ethernet?

Yep that's the whatsit!

The wireless card is built into the laptop somewhere, I cannot see it.

Not sure what an ISP is, but I am wilt talktalk if that's what you mean.

At the moment my internet is plugged into the USB.

Yes, talk talk is your ISP (internet service provider).

If you go on Internet Explorer and click on Tools - Options - Connections, the Dial up and virtual private network settings should be blank. In addition, click on LAN settings and ensure that proxy server is unticked.

Emily, why are you using USB at all?

Have you gone into the router (probably http://192.168.0.1 or 1.1) and configured all the settings for you talk talk connection.

If your wireless car is an intel based on you will probably find it is an intel wireless card, but it might be a dell one if made by dell. Since you are running windows this should be ok. I take it you can connect to the wireless router and that the PC actually has a card in it rather than just the lights for wireless. (Sorry but i have seen this before).

Are talk talk still having problems like they were a little while ago.#

Also turn OFF mimo and just set the routher to 802.11b/g and see if that works.

Have to say i personally hate belkin hardware, but i used to work for an ISP so i have other reason for that.

The situation as it stands at the moment is - I can be online by having the cable from the phone socket into the non-wireless broadband then plugged into my laptop's USB. I have used the laptop in loads of diffrent wi-fi places like airports, friend's houses etc - it just goes no problem.

When I try to go wireless I plug the wire from the phone socket into the back of the wireless box. It's lights start flashing and a messge pop ups on the laptop saying 'one of your prefered networks is in range, connect to it? I say yes, and it says it is connected with excellant strength.

Then I load my internet explorer, and after much umming and arring the computer gives me my home page (briskoda of course) and I am only allowed to view offline.

I tried all the things that Gillywibble suggested, but to no pervail.

I had a colleague with the same problem a couple of weeks ago. Have you actually gone into the router managment page (http://192.168.0.1 is the one for a Belkin I believe) and have you entered your Broadband connection username and password - this is usually your e-mail address and password but not always, it depends on your ISP - who it is you pay for broadband.

Unfortunately my classroom is offline for maintenance or I'd be suggesting you login and I set it up for you (usually takes 15 minutes!!!).

The other question to think about is have you activated any of the security settings on the router?

Sounds spot-on, Neil. Emily - you have a wireless network, your laptop can talk to the router, but the router isn't connecting to the TalkTalk network. Get the instructions that came with the router and follow the part that tells you how to connect to your ISP (Internet Service Provider) - i.e. TalkTalk.

...what he said. your laptop's talking nicely to your wireless router, and is connecetd as a network. it's just that your router isn't configured to talk to the outside world yet. on the router setup page you need to give it your broadband username/password.

if you get stuck phone talktalk's helpline, they should be able to talk you through this, if the posts here don't help.

if you get pigsick of it, PM me and i'll walk you through it, easy once you've done it once!

ric

Have you managed to get this sorted yet Emily?

I have an ADSL Wireless Router from Belkin, same one I expect.

The management page is: http://192.168.2.1/ (not the address given above)

You need to plug the router into the telephone socket, turn it on, then connect to it wirelessly with your laptop, use Internet Explorer to go to the above address, run the configuration wizard to tell it your talktalk username & password, hit connect and you're good to go.

Once you get it working you'll also want to enable some wireless security and set a password for the router but worry about that once it's all working.

No I haven't got it working yet. I have been having serious internet issues because I could not stay online for longer than 30 seconds and everytime my house phone rang the internet would disconnect. I changed telephone points I was trying to connect through, and it has worked much better.

Thanks for your help on this, you have reminded me to keep trying.

When I click that management page it comes up as an unknown site - any ideas why?

Emily,

First sorry for an RTFM..

go look in the manual and have a look for instructions on configuring the device, it will give you a webpage to type in when connected to it (by a wire if i were you). This will allow you to set up your ISP details and your Wireless network (Please use at least WEP, better still WPA/WPA2 for encryption).

Once you have done this you should be able to connect to the internet.

Additionally if your ADSL modem is disconnecting when the phone rings, I assume you have a microfilter on the phone line where telephones plug in and also where your ADSL router connects to the phone line. If not this can cause the disconnection. Additionally if you do have microfilter make sure they are the active type, usually a small box dangling off a lead, rather than the passive type (look like a splitter) as these are more effective at filtering the frequencies correctly.

Another point to consider is that if your ISP ahs just tried to upgrade you to 8Mb and you are having connectivity issues you should speak to them about it as I have seen major problems with DSL MAX (up to 8Mb DSL) on more rural lines.

Hope that Helps