Mysterious name resolution issues on Westell USB 6200/Bridged PPPoE

[plshelp]

Hi,

We have been experiencing a very mysterious case of the total lack of DNS resolution when using a Westell 6200 and Windows XP's PPPoE client via a USB interface (Bellsouth as ISP). We had a perfectly working setup up until two days ago. Then one evening, we ran Ad-Aware and Spybot (I believe those were the only potentially configuration-altering tools we did run), and after rebooting the machine, we found that we could not connect to any website using its full name, while IP addresses did in fact work.

Connecting to the Westell via the web interface, we found that it was set up properly in bridge mode, with DHCP nontheless enabled. The first thing we tried was disabling DHCP and hard-wiring valid domain name information in the DNS servers setting of the network configuration. This did not have any effect, even when we did it on both the network configuration on the PPPoE connection and on the modem's 'Ethernet' connection over which the PPPoE connections.

We tried many, many other things, from running Windows' system restore back to a point previous, to trying with various settings for manual and automatic IPs, gateways, and DNS servers. Nothing at all seems to work, and possibly the only reason we have any Internet access at all, albeit with IP address only, is that it somehow uses the westell as a default gateway. When running IPconfig, the DNS we put in shows up as the DNS server, yet Windows doesn't seem to rely on it to resolve anything. When using nslookup, even, the results come out properly, yet when pinging any named host, we get a 'not found' error.

One of the things we tried was connecting a different laptop to the modem, a work laptop that connects to a VPN...this laptop worked just as it did before, so we suspect it's something wrong with the original computer's windows conf. We tried repairing/restoring TCP/IP, hard-wiring DNS information in the Windows registry, but nothing works. When running the Network diagnosis in the "Help" section of Windows, it shows 'failed' as status on the gateway for the westell connection. It seems it's using the same 65.13.x.x address both as an IP and as a gateway. ¿Should it be doing this? ¿Why does the westell's 'ethernet' even have an IP address?

I would much appreciate any help on this matter, especially from anyone who has successfully configured PPPoE with a USB'ed Westell.

Thank you

 

[VirtualLarry]

Tried "LSPFix" ? Tried right-clicking on the network connecting in XP and selecting "Repair"? Uninstall and re-install the USB networking driver?

IMHO, those USB-port psuedo-network drivers are a lot more trouble than they are worth, and tend to cause networking-stack problems. I would strongly suggest installing a regular PCI NIC into the machine, and use the ethernet port on the Westell.

Btw, did Ad-Aware and/or Spybot actually find anything on the syste to "fix"? Did you let it "fix" the issues? That was the reason that I asked my first question, about "LSPFix", because certain spyware can get embedded into the network stack, and using Ad-Aware/Spybot to forcibly remove it, can occasionally cause future network connectivity to fail. However, I have also seen issues with USB psuedo-network drivers too, so I can't clearly place blame on AA/SB.

 

[Schadenfroh]

if lsp fix does not work, try winsockfix

 

[plshelp]

Hi,

Thanks to both of you for your replies...we're about ready to try LSPFix or winsock fix, but first we checked some other settings...first of all, we tried connecting the PC to the Internet via dialup (same ISP). Again, the result was the same...IPs could be reached directly, but their names wouldn't resolve. We tried using nslookup on the DNS servers assigned by DHCP on the connection, and using nslookup the servers responded with the proper IPs...but when doing a simple ping or any other connection attempt, the names wouldn't resolve.

Also, something a tad unsual was that for both the DSL connection and the dialup connection, ipconfig revealed that the DHCP-assigned IP address and the DHCP-assigned default gateway were the same IP. I'm not sure if this is normal. Another thing I should mention is that the PC is running Norton Internet Security, which I've heard can interfere with connections, although I don't know why it would interfere with regular lookups but not with a nslookup lookup.

Thanks again

 

[VirtualLarry]

Here's a FAQ page on the subject from DLSR:
http://www.dslreports.com/faq/10082

If you are running NIS, then that is a local software firewall, and if it is mis-configured, it could well be interfering with your internet connection. I've never run that firewall myself, so I defer you to reading the manual to troubleshoot possible connection-related issues stemming from that.