My cousin has a strange Internet problem...

[xirtam]

The relevance of this topic is hovering somewhere between the "Networking" and "Technical Support" forums, so I thought I'd try here first since the problem is specific to networking.

I talked to her on Yahoo messenger yesterday. She said that Yahoo messenger worked, but neither Internet Explorer nor MSN messenger worked.

That struck me as weird. I told her to IPConfig and figured out that she was running on a static IP (typical local subnet of 192.x.x.x). She's connected with I think three other machines to a router. None of these other machines have these problems, though I'm not physically there so I can't verify how they're configured.

She can ping her DNS server, and the name server is performing address resolution correctly, because when she tries to ping microsoft.com or whatever it returns the IP. The ping request fails, but it does that through my operational network (in DOS, anyway) too.

I had her try receiving an autoassigned IP address through DHCP. That worked, she got a new IP address and was able to connect to Yahoo to talk to me again, but Internet Explorer and MSN messenger still didn't work.

She said her connection worked fine in the dorms, but now that she moved out to an apartment, it's not working.

What am I missing? She's using Windows Millennium, which I'm not fond of, but it should still work. I have no idea why Yahoo Messenger would work, but the rest wouldn't. I had her experiment with a few options in IE (Tools, Internet Options, Lan Settings) to no avail. Any suggestions on what else I should have her try?

 

[amdskip]

I would get rid of windows ME and see what happens. Run 2k or xp instead.

 

[xirtam]

Personally, I would too. Throw linux on there and see if I'm getting the same issues. But my cousin won't use linux... and I wouldn't make her.

And I really don't want to tell her that the only solution is to spend the $100 on the Windows XP upgrade. If Windows Millennium can't connect to the Internet, you'd think Microsoft would have spotted that as a design flaw.

 

[chsh1ca]

Well, before you take the rather absurd and notedly non-troubleshooting step of using another OS, how about you get her to check if IE is configured to use a proxy. I think MSN Messenger gets its connection details from IE, whereas Yahoo can get that info separately. Just check tools -> Internet Options -> Connections -> Lan Settings and see if there's any proxy information entered. Check that out and let us know.

 

[xirtam]

Yeah, that was the first thing I had her check. Everything was cleared... no checkboxes checked, no proxy info recorded... just like the way my system was set up on my home network.

 

[chsh1ca]

Have her download another small lightweight browser or talk her through using telnet to see if she can get webserver responses. If she can, then it's definitely an IE configuration issue.

At the command line:
telnet <target webserver> 80
and then, if it's connected, type:
GET "/" HTTP/1.0 and hit enter twice. It should spit back some HTML.

If you connect, you know it's not a network issue, and that it's definitely an issue with IE's configuration.

 

[Fallen Kell]

Actually I thought the command was:
GET / HTTP/1.0


Without the "s around the path you want.

 

[chsh1ca]

Only if you're looking for a real webpage. Really, once you've connected you know it's not network related, and that it's configuration related. You're just looking for a response from the server. You'll get a standard "I don't understand your request" response from the server if you use what I posted, so it really makes no difference. You are correct though, it is without quotes if you are looking for the real page to be displayed.

 

[carolinaviking]

BUT, if she's getting yahoo messenger info, then most likely her connection is fine, so it has to be related to configuration of IE since her inet connection is passing traffic. it probably isn't the isp and that would be the only other source of the problem. if the router to which she is connected at the isp end is having a problem, that will be discovered and fixed rather quickly, but since it is passing traffic on yahoo messenger, it is most likely not the isp. maybe she should restore defaults in IE's properties' advanced tab.