Intermittent connection issues across 3 computers

[asoccerplayer99]

At my workplace, I have a broadband DSL connection devoted to 3 different computers. One is a Linux CentOS 5 machine, and the other 2 are Windows XP. The problem I am having is extremely strange, so bear with me..

I will be on a website, speedguide.net for example, on one of the XP boxes. Then out of nowhere, with no apparent reason, speedguide.net will stop working for me. I can open other IE/Firefox/Opera windows and navigate to other sites, but speedguide.net will not work. If I walk to either of the other 2 computers, speedguide.net WILL work. This intermittent loss of connection happens on *all 3 machines* too. As I'm typing this on the Linux machine, the yahoo.com main page wont load in Firefox.

The solution on the XP machines is to right click the Network Connections icon in the system tray and click "Repair Connection." After it goes through and does whatever it does, everything works for a while. There is no apparent timing to the problem, it could happen once in a day or 5 times in an hour. Theres no pattern to the websites that wont come through, and programs like MSN Messenger have never had this problem on those machines, only websites. It happens using all 3 browsers: IE, Firefox 3, and Opera 9.x.

As far as hardware goes, all 3 machines are plugged into the wall at different places, and all 3 connections lead straight to a switch, which is plugged directly into the DSL modem.

Obviously its a hardware problem, happening on 3 different computers and across operating systems, but the IT guy says no, it could still be a software bug. (He lives a few states away so I'm stuck waiting for him to come fix this for a while) I'm not sure how much I believe that though, so if anyone has any insight on this, I would appreciate immensely. What exactly does Windows XP SP2 do when I click on "Repair Connection" anyways? Thanks for any help

 

[Lemon law]

to asoccerplayer99,

I really try to avoid threads where my knowledge of your set up is not extensive, but it really as a guess sounds like you have dynamic addressing on your computers, and those dynamic addresses are not remembered by a dumb device like a switch. And one thing a repair connection will do is reestablish an IP for dynamic addressed PC. Which will last until the next intermittent event, and then a new available
dynamic IP address will be assigned.

My guess is that you might establish a static address for each PC, then if anything goes intermittent, all the PC's instantly know what their Static IP address is.

Not sure how you would establish a static IP on your set up, but on my set up, I just cheat. While the connection is working, I open up my local area connection, click on properties, I then highlighted TCP/IP and again clicked on properties. When I first did it, it showed a dynamically addressed IP of 192.168.0.234. I then bulleted use this IP address, filled in my default gateway and subnet mask. And now it always uses this address. To find your missing data on subnet mask and default gateway, go start---run---type cmd---and enter, and then in the new dialog box type ipconfig /all and enter. Note space between the
g and /. To reverse the effects, just rebullet obtain an ip address automatically.

You might try it to see if it works on one XP computer. If it does, do the other XP computer but make sure you do not reuse an already used static address. I am not sure how you do it in Linux.

 

[Tbirdkid]

is the switch a managed switch, or is it just a dumb switch? what does the command ipconfig /all tell ya?