New computers aren't able to get to the internet

[amheck]

Hi group,

My wife works at a small lawfirm, and they have Verizon DSL, hooked up via a 4-port Linksys wired router and a 24 port switch. The guy who did all of the internet wiring and hookups is now gone. We are replacing all of the old computers with new Dells. I test out the internet connectivity at home with my cable modem and everything works fine. But when I take them to her office and hook up the LAN cable, I can never get them connected. Is it possible that he has the computers filtered by MAC address or something which might be stopping the new computers from getting connected? Like I said, all of the old computers are fine - its just the new ones I'm having a problem with.

Thanks for any advice,
Aaron

 

[Fardringle]

Does the office network use DHCP? If the existing computers have static IP addresses, you'll probably need to assign static info to the new PCs as well. It is possible that the router is restricting Internet access based on MAC address, but I'd look at the IP configuration first.

 

[amheck]

Yeah, that was my first thought, too. The older computers have everything set to "obtain automatically" in the network settings. The old and new PC's seem to have the Windows Network properties the same.

 

[Zugzwang152]

when the new computers are plugged in at work, can you obtain an IP and/or ping the router's IP?

 

[amheck]

Originally posted by: Zugzwang152
when the new computers are plugged in at work, can you obtain an IP and/or ping the router's IP?

The IP I get is something like 169.254.xxx.xxx or some other bogus IP. The same general IP I will get here at home if something is wrong with my internet connection. I don't believe it to be a valid IP.

Do you know how I'd get the IP of the router if I don't know it?

 

[jhkim]

Did you replace the cable that connects switch to router??

 

[amheck]

Nope, wires are left exactly as they were. There's a whole mess of cables back in the wiring closet, so I'm hoping to avoid having to figure out where they are all going.

 

[Fardringle]

You can get the router's address from a working PC (type IPCONFIG at a command prompt and look for the Default Gateway).

Make sure the non-working PCs have valid network connections. First step to do this is to physically reseat the network cables and make sure that the LEDs on the network cards light up. Then try to ping the loopback address (127.0.0.1) and the default gateway (router) address. You'll probably have to enter an (unused) static IP address in the router's DHCP ranger. If the lights are on and the loopback works but you are unable to contact the router then you are likely seeing MAC address (or NetBIOS name) filtering.

 

[JackMDS]

Since the computer worked at home, 169.xx.xx.xx means that your computers are no really connected to the Router, or the Router?s DHCP is off, or misconfigured.

DSL does not use MAC authentication, entry level Verizon DSL uses PPPOE. Depending on type of connection that you got from Verizon, once you get a Valid local IP on the computers, you might look into the DSL Authentication.

Link to: DSL PPPOE and Cable/DSL Routers.

:sun:

 

[Fardringle]

Originally posted by: amheck
My wife works at a small lawfirm, and they have Verizon DSL, hooked up via a 4-port Linksys wired router and a 24 port switch.

With that type of configuration, the DSL PPPoE authentication shouldn't be a factor since the router itself should be performing the authentication (unless each PC needs to authenticate itself). I have worked with Linksys consumer and small business routers that are capable of filtering uplink/Internet access (and DHCP client access) by MAC address which is why I would suspect that if everything else is connected and configured properly.