Dad has had cable broadband with Win 98 for ages. Works very well and is infinitely more stable than systems using phone lines. Ethernet modem, not wireless.

Message today from dad (who is 91)

Err – my internet is not working

OK I will go have a look – sure enough DNS error ie cant find server

Checked all the cables and the modem lights looked correct/ steady

Went home to get my WinXP laptop because I also use NTL/ Virgin cable.
Connected that to Dad’s NTL system – same problem

Phoned NTL (OK, Virgin) help desk
Explained the problem

She asked me to connect up my laptop then (remember hard wired via cable – not wireless) and then her instructions:-

Control panel
Network connections
Local area connection
Support - checks IP is showing and is valid – OK

General tab - click on disable

Now tells me to close the computer down and to switch off the modem

Switch the modem back on first – wait 1 min
Switch the computer back on

Bingo – have internet connection

Thank you I say – now can we do that with my dad’s Win 98 computer

Sorry Sir, we are not trained to give any support for Win98 (she did not sound old enough to have even seen Win 98!!)

What can I do?

I can give you a support number to phone for that – it is an 09 premium rate number

S**T !

ANYONE out there remember Win98 and have any idea

a. What the problem may be (and may WHY it suddenly went wrong)?
b. How to more or less duplicate the instructions given to me for WinXP?

Snod

Snod

I am with NTL/Virgin and was on the 2MB broadband. They have been upgrading the 2Mb broadband to 10MB and after I was upgraded, about 3 weeks ago, I was having trouble with loosing the broadband connection, but not the last week for some reason. (I am using a wireless connection).

I have tested all my configurations etc., and cannot find the problem - but I mention this as I am wondering if your father has been upgraded from 2MB to 10MB?

Regarding Win 98, I still have Win 98 on on another dual boot laptop & will test the broadband connection on it tonight or tomorrow. If no one has been able to help you by then, I will get back to you & give you the results.

One thing though, I would suggest leaving the modem switched off for a few minutes at least.

I didn't want to mention this in the previous post as it may deviate from your question!

I realise you may already be aware of what I am going to say below

Using win98 for the internet is a security risk. There is too much detail for me to go into here, but even if your Dad isn't putting any of his personal information on it, his pc is still open to being hacked into - and could be the cause of the problem?

Personally, I would never use Win98 for the internet, especially using ANY personal information.

Is he using and anti-virus programe like AVG and a firewall like Zone Alarm? - Even though I am asking this, I don't believe you can use them anymore for Win98, I might be wrong?

One other thing to check is in the "device manager" - for a yellow question mark or light bulb (can't remember what it is in win98) - Recentley a friend of mine suddenly lost his internet connection and it turned out that for no reason his ethernet drivers were missing and he had to reinstall them!

Not configured anything on windows 98 for a while, if you look on your windows xp laptop connection, you should be able to find the DNS servers used. Try entering those onto your dads computer. Leave the IP address as obtain automatically. see if that works?

Thanks for the advice Folks

Dad has been on 10 Meg BBand for ages now (while I am still on 2 Meg via a set-top box!! My upgrade is in a week or so) and he has not had any problems ie excellent system stability over the last couple of years.

I do regular (weekly) checks on his machine for viruses, adware etc - and I have never found anything bar the odd bit of adware. MacAfee is installed plus Adaware & Spybot. Some like MacAfee some do not, but it obviously works. Anyway, a hacker may be bored to death with posts etc about SAGA, British Legion, Police Homewatch + monitoring of shares on the Net

Plan today is to unplug dad's computer and to bring it to my house where I will connect it to my NTL line and see what happens.

I should add that dad being on Win98 is a function of his computer hardware ie a small Patriot bookcase machine with a whole 0.4Meg processor and a mere 0.5 meg RAM + tiny hard disk (still only 25% filled). It simply would not take WinXP

Cheers, Snod

Snod, Sorry that I went on about something you already are aware off!!

Can I make a suggestion about renewing the IP address. It's a while since I used it on Win98, which is a different way to Winxp etc, but here is a link to a webpage that gives you some info:
Win 98/ME - Using "Winipcfg" to Troubleshoot Networking Problems

Go down to "How do I use winipcfg.exe to troubleshoot connections?" to read about how to use the Renew function

Also - I tried my Win98 system last night and couldn't get the Virgin broadband working on it, but I need to spend more time on it - but no luck upto now, sorry.

Right, try using OpenDNS; to change the DNS servers in 9x, (I havent touched 9x for 5 years or more, as I changed my home network to Windows 2000 back in 1998 so forgive me if this is incorrect) go to control panel > network > highlight the network adapter you are using > then click properties > then there should be a tab called DNS or DNS configuration or summit. Click enable DNS, and then put these servers into it:

208.67.222.222
208.67.220.220

Then click apply or ok. This will usually override any ISP and/or modem allocated DNS servers. Now do a DNS flush, to do this got to start > run > type cmd and press enter > then type "ipconfig /flushdns" (without the quotes) and press return > then do this a second time and close the Command Prompt window.

Then restart Internet Explorer and see what happens. Report back with what happens.

Btw, McAfee, AVG and Zone Alarm, to be quite frank, are utter turd - free they may be, but you can't put a price on security, ESET Smart Security (Nod32) or Kaspersky are the products to have (and actually be able to rely on - and don't wank your computers resources - in fact Nod has the smallest memory footprint and CPU load of any AV on the market, by far).

For the love of god, if the laptop has a 1GB hard drive (2000 Professional requires 654MB out of the box + service pack size), 233Mhz CPU and 64MB RAM, change the OS to Windows 2000, it is no heavier than 98 but far far far more secure, stable, efficient and refined, and a very similar interface!! With SP4 installed, it is also quite compatible with many older programmes.

Matt

Fings 'aint never as you expect

Control Panel - OK
Network - OK

But that pop-up only has 3 tabs at the top of a page
Configuration - identification - Access Control

When Configuration is selected (the default) an UPPER box shows the network components installed. The top one is Client for Microsoft Networks. Then there is

Davicom9102/A fast ethernet adapter
followed by various dial up adapters

LOWER down in the box it indicates Primary Network logon as
Client for Microsoft Networks

[This emphasis on Client for Microsoft Networks seems to be the same on my Win XP laptop so I presume it is OK]

Under the IDENTIFICATION tab there are 3 small boxes indicating
Computer Name
Workgroup
Computer description

Under ACCESS CONTROL tab there are two highlight buttons
Share level access control (highlighted)
User level access control (greyed out)

OK so I highlight Client for Microsoft Windows as the Network Adapter and then from the 3 tabs below

Add - Remove - Properties

I select properties

on the next pop-up page there is only one tab - General
In the top part of the box titled Logon Validation is a button to
"log on to Windows NT domain"

In the lower part of the box titled Network Logon Options there are two buttons

"Quick Logon" (greyed out)
"Logon and restore network connections" - autoselected

NO SIGN of a tab indicating DNS / DNS configuration

What next ?

What beats me is WHY the system suddenly failed to connect to the internet. Dad is prone to "dropping" files in the wrong places when he tried drag & drop but NO WAY will he fiddle with any setting. Basically all he does is send/ receive emails, use Word to write letters and read the news etc on the web.

Snod

UPDATE - I have dad's computer at my house now. It still will not connect to the NTL/ Virgin cable network, which is of course working fine with my own machines

<< need smiley for 'pulls hair out in frustration' >>

Is there a properties box for "Davicom9102/A fast ethernet adapter"?

Is he connecting to the net using a SACM (modem), STB (digital TV box) or an integrated modem-router?

You can control the DNS servers using netsh in CMD, but I don't want to go down that route just yet - for non-Linux users, it can get complicated.

If you can, try the DNS flush twice and try and renew the DHCP configuration (DOCSIS cable relies heavily on this):

Command prompt: start, run, type CMD and press enter
DNS Flush - command prompt, type "ipconfig /flushdns" and press enter.
DHCP Renewal - command prompt, type "ipconfig /registerdns" and press enter. Then do another DNS flush.

See if that helps.

From what I remember the Win98 version of ipconfig does not have the flushdns option.

You have to start> run "winipcfg". Then from its dialog box, first click on "release all" wait till it's finished, then "renew all."

Also I don't think you can even use run> CMD in Win98.

Snod/Matt I have'nt run Win98 for ages so can't remember where things are, but did used to have to delete the equivalent to XP's "Windows Network Connection" sometimes and create a new one. Didn't matter how much you faffed around with it, it wouldn't do anything unless you started afresh.

I think on Win98 this was the network adaptor - wherever the tcp/ip settings are, I guess this holds logon and passwords as well - can't remember.

I wasn't using cable broadband but it was coming in on ethernet port in a similar manner (hardware firewall).

You could well be correct, ipconfig was deffo in NT4, which was released long before 98, so would have thought they would have taken it across, but then again, it is Microsoft we are talking about here.

Stupid MS for not realising that networking would become an integral part of any mainstream OS within years.

Im assuming the network shell exists in 98?

Netsh was there on Win98 but I never got it to work, I put this down to firewalls and some settings I had attacked.

Ah well in that case, try typing the following to change the DNS servers in command prompt:

netsh interface ip set dns name=”Local Area Connection” 208.67.222.222

press enter

then add the second DNS server:

netsh interface ip add dns name=”Local Area Connection” 208.67.220.220

So long as the first one works, the DNS should resolve correctly. The problem with the network shell, is the command lines tend to vary from OS to OS, I know for a fat that the command lines in Windows 2003 are somewhat changed from XP, and they are both running the same kernel and core-OS...

you guys are talking above my head now with things like DNS flushes and DHCP configuration etc

For info
Dad uses a regular cable modem (NTL 250)but just at the moment I have his machine connected via my Set Top Box system. I was not REALLY expecting that dad's machine would connect via my "funny" STB system. I simply made the hook up in my house so that in peace/ quiet I could sit and look at the various options shown by Win 98 Control Panel - network ... and the subsequent pages. It is also 5+ years (or more) since I used Win98 and as we have all found out our memories are not what they used to be.

Tomorrow I will take dad's computer back to his house and will try the connection moves suggested.

What DD is saying about having to delete the equivalent to XP's "Windows Network Connection" etc sort of rings true. When I was connecting MY Win XP lappy to dad's NTL cable yesterday it did not work initially. However, following instructions from the NTL person I did that delete, re-established the connection and was able to access the web. When I asked the NTL person how to do that same move for Win 98 was when I was told "we are not trained to give that advice".

Snod

Talk about the blind leading the blind

IT IS ALL WORKING - via my set top box

I THINK I did what you guys have called a DNS flush (sounds painful).

What I actually did was

Start
Run
type winipcfg

then

a. I selected the Davicom9102/A fast ethernet adapter from the drop down box

b. Selected "release"

c. Selected "renew"

Then when I tried the internet - it worked

So, who is a happy bunny then ?

let us hope tomorrow a repeat of that when the machine is connected in dad's house will be equally successful

Thanks for your help folks

Sweet, glad you sorted it; im always using the DNS Flush utility for getting around TTL times when changing servers etc!

One of the best tools Microsoft made!

You shouldn't need any server settings for a LAN connection, especially if you have had it working before.


In Internet explorer go to Tools. Internet Options, Connections, LAN Settings, then make sure the box is ticked where it says Automatically Detect Settings.

That's all the settings you need for Virgin broadband.

If you get your broadband through a TV box, it will have been done through the provisioning procedure, so the original PC should still work, but any other PC's on the system will need to be set up using your NTL username and 10 figure PID number.

If it is through a modem, once set up, it should work on any PC


Does your dad's PC have a seperate LAN card? If so,it may be a driver problem with the LAN card. Check control Panel/Add/Remove Hardware/Device manager and check that the LAN card doesn't have any questionmarks or error flags on it.

Unfortunately Win98 is no longer supported by Microsoft so you cannot get security updates or any new versions of Internet Explorer.

You could probably get a reasonable second hand PC with XP on it for less than £200 nowadays

It doesnt half get annoying when people don't bother to read the threads before posting a response...