Network connection trouble with laptop

[thestrangebrew1]

My friend has an Acer 5520 series laptop and an Android tablet. Prior to getting the tablet, she was able to access the wireless network no problems. However, once she got the tablet and connected it to the network, the laptop won't connect. I haven't had the chance to check her network settings, but she gave me the laptop to take home and it sees and accesses my network fine both wired & wireless. I'm not sure how connecting the tablet to the wireless network would adjust any settings within the network, and I've never run into a problem where one device can access the network but other(s) can't. Usually it's an all or nothing thing which would indicate network settings, but I'm not so sure this time. What would cause this?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Not having a large enough DHCP pool to hand out addresses on the route could cause that.

Make sure that there are a least two DHCP slots available.

I ran into this once when helping the owner of a coffee shop figure out why the public wifi was spotty.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

Thanks I'll look into this next time I go to her house.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

Bumping this thread because I was able to get to her house and check on some things. I checked to make sure there was more than enough DHCP slots available and that wasn't an issue. I can't remember the number (had a few drinks last night after giving up) but I went to her sister's house today and decided to check the wireless connection at her house. I ran into the same problem. On her and her sister's network, wireless shows "Local Access Only" and unidentified network (the sister's wireless network name is WIR0_E or something like that) and that is the network I can connect to, but I don't have internet access.

My friend's Norton sub expired, so I removed it, then used the Norton Removal tool, and made sure that IPV6 wasn't checked (she's running Vista HP). Not sure what else I could do. Acer came with some software, including some wireless epower management stuff which I disabled on startup to make sure vista and the acer stuff wasn't conflicting but that didn't help.

What's even more weird, on both of these networks, I can connect my laptop/tablet/smartphone and it connects to the internet just fine. There's 2 things in common: They both have the same ISP, local company, and the laptop. Suggestions?

 

[John Connor]

What type of router is it? Have you tried updating the firmware?