Hi, everyone,
I'm working on setting up an old computer for a couple of friends of mine. I wiped the old HD and reinstalled the system builder's version of Windows XP SP2. I reinstalled the necessary drivers from the Dell reinstall CDs, including the network adapter driver. I have no problem connecting to the Internet in my own house, which has Verizon FiOS.
When I go to my friends' house, which has Verizon DSL, I cannot connect. They use a Westell 6100 modem. All filters are in place correctly, and everything worked fine up until 2 weeks ago when a storm came through. After the storm, they could not boot up their old PC (leading me to this project of getting them a different computer). Nevertheless, they haven't changed any configurations in their household, moved any filters, etc. There is no router, and this is the only computer in the house.
When I connect the computer to the modem via ethernet cable, Windows shows the icon that it is attempting to connect, then it immediately puts the red X over the icon and says "A network cable is disconnected". It goes through this process every 15 - 30 seconds or so. The ethernet light on the modem is NOT on, but the power light is steady, the DSL light is steady, and the Internet light is blinking intermittently.
I have tried...
- following all troublehsooting directions on the Verizon DSL installation CD.
- power cycling the modem and rebooting the computer
- changing out ethernet cables
- turning off XP and AVG firewalls
- uninstalling and reinstalling the network adapter driver through the Dell disks and through the device manager
- setting up a network through the XP wizard
- connecting a completely different computer (MacBook with Windows XP installed) to the modem via ethernet cable
...all to no avail.
I have also tried using a USB cable, which gave just a moment of success. The USB light on the modem did come on after the USB drivers were installed, and I got the home page to load once in IE7, but I could not get any other page to load. Eventually, not even the home page would load. I don't know if this is a connectivity issue or a timeout issue. I will be experimenting with the timeout settings this week. However, using a USB cable instead of an ethernet cord seems more like a workaround than a true solution to me, especially when the ethernet connection should be working.
I don't think this is a modem problem -- the couple took their modem to a local computer shop that checked it out and said it was okay. Verizon tech support has also tested the modem remotely, and it seems they can see the modem through the phone lines, and it appears to be functioning fine. I also don't think it's a problem in the NIC because I can get online via FiOS ethernet connection at my house. And I know it's not an ethernet cable problem because I use this particular cable all the time. So where could the issue be?
Any help that can be offered is so greatly appreciated. This has been bugging me for a week now!
Thanks,
-Barb
