Wireless Connection Issues

[AsusGamer]

I recently had a friend aquire a dell dimension 8400. He wanted to connect it to his network so he purchased a usb wireless adapter (will get model number later). Once we boot the PC, it works fine and am able to browse the internet, play games, and do anything anyone else can.

After a few minutes of this that varies from reboot to reboot, the connection seems to drop out while I still have a very strong signal. I can still ping any website and receive all packets back. And he can still login and play World of Warcraft (all internet) while getting "A page cannot be displayed" message continuously. I have rebooted his router several times to see if it needed to Sync with the new node on the network, i've tried releasing/renewing the IP and disabling/re-enabling the NIC card once I lose the connection but nothing seems to give me the connection back short of rebooting the PC.

The weird thing is that when the connection is dropped from any browser (IE7 and firefox), I can still ping away at all the sites and even play any game over the internet. Just looking for some ideas.

[AsusGamer]

Another thing that started... whenever he downloads something, when the browser loses connection, his download will lose connection and fail but he can still play games online.

Anyone have any kind of idea on where to start?

[Jo777]

Is it set to work offline? Or somehow switch to working offline in the middle of his game play?

[AsusGamer]

Nope its not set to do anything like that.

The USB device he is using is a Netgear WG111.

He can connect to programs such as Teamspeak and ventrillo and stay logged in for hours, can constantly connect to the servers when his browsers stop functioning, and play games and disconnect and reconnect to them while his browsers stop functioning.

It seems that after about 10-15 minutes of running, he just drops his browsers from connecting for some reason. He can ping sites, do nslookups, play games, and all kinds of other things, but he cannot surf the internet after those initial few minutes. If he disconnects WG111 and plugs it back in, it will function for another few minutes and he'll be able to browse with IE or firefox but then it goes back out for it again.

It is very weird. His laptop is using the exact same device to connect to his network and it works perfectly. If we disconnect it from the labtop his signal still drops out so they aren't causing the other computers problems.

If he can ping sites, and do nslookups so his DNS is working, I don't know how he cannot get to any sites by IP or using their domain names.

Another thing to note, when he is downloading something, the download will say connection lost when his browser goes out. I've been logged into a teamspeak with him and able to talk to him nonstop while this occurs. He cannot connect to messengers when his browsers have stopped functioning as well.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

[AsusGamer]

Anyone have anything to they may possibly think is causing this? Im out of ideas.

I hooked the computer up wired to my router and his computer still did the same thing on my network. Still can connect to games but after a few minutes, the browser/downloads will all lose connection until a reboot.

[johnwill]

I looked, but I don't have a clue. The only thing that jumps to mind is some sort of malware.

[AsusGamer]

I posted in the Hijack this section of the forums but havent recieved a reply that it was even being looked into.

http://www.techsupportforum.com/security-center/hijackthis-log-help/130978-internet-connection-issues.html

[johnwill]

Go over and "bump" the post, see if that helps.

[JamesO]

Might try to access a web site by putting the IP address in the browser. Try a tracert and let the IP address resolve, then keep them handy for when the problem comes up.

If you can access the web sites by IP and not www, then there is most likely a DNS issue??

Is Norton or McAfee running on this machine by any chance?

JamesO

[AsusGamer]

I tried getting to websites via IP after it goes out.. no dice.

The machine as AVG on it with another scanner that I can't remove because it looks for a network resource to uninstall it. I can't figure that one out.

Tracert resolves even after the computer loses the browser connectivity