[CaptinSxb]

In my house there are 3 things that use the internet. A laptop, a desktop, and a xbox. Because of the locations of the things, the modem goes to a router. The router is connected to a computer and one of the wires goes through the attic to another room where it goes into another router. That router goes to the laptop and the xbox. Just reinstalled XP on the desktop and everything was working fine...until now. All of a sudden none of the routers in my house will send internet out to the laptop or xbox. The only way I'm writing this is by connecting the modem directly to the desktop. There were no power surges that could have fried anything or anything else of that nature. Tried resetting everything including drivers and settings, but no luck. Ive used all my knowledge about this. If you can help pealse do so, my brother needs his laptop for school.

[Judas]

try reseting the router (should be a button on the back or somewhere)

[CaptinSxb]

I've done that many times. But still nothing

[CaptinSxb]

Just reinstalled windows on both comps checked all connections and reset the routers. Ive got a clean slate, someone must have some sort of idea.

[Vidmaster23]

A couple of things to check:

Make sure both of your routers have different IP addresses. I have the same setup as you, my first router which is downstairs is 192.168.1.1, while the router upstairs in my room that connects to the one downstairs is 192.168.1.2. If the routers have the same IP there is going to be a major conflict.

Here's what I would do to diagnose the problem. Bring your laptop downstairs as well as your Xbox. Connect everything to that first router that connects directly to your modem and see if it works. if it works you either have a bad cat5 going through your attic, or something is wrong with the attic router or it's configuration.

[CaptinSxb]

neither of the computers work when hooked up to router. i use xbox connect which is a program that makes the xbox think its playing a system link game. so i need a computer to check the xbox. seeing as i dont have one i cant check it. How do i check the ip of the router? or does the ipconfig in the command prompt give the ip of the router?

[Vidmaster23]

it depends on what kind of router you have. do you have a linksys? that's really the only one i know how to access. to access a linksys router go to 192.168.1.1 in your web browser that will allow you to access the router configuration.

then under router IP In setup / basic setup, you can choose what you want your router ip address to be.

[Judas]

ip config, will only tell you the ip of the machine that router has given you.. and possibly the Gateway OR the internet connection IP itself... depending on various settings applied.. be carefull, i've come across at least 3 or 4 linksys routers that weren't routers at all... they basicallu hubs with a wan port... very disapointing..

You could try linksys's home page and tech support faq page... they usually will have quick facts on about various issues.... and you'd be serprised... they will even have the issues you didn't think they would have.. and how to solve them...

[CaptinSxb]

The routers are netgear and siemens. The netgear one came with a disc to adjust the ips and other settings but for some reason this desktop cant open the disc. So i hooked up the routers the other way around and moved the laptop to the same room as the desktop and set the ip of the router to automatically configure it. So now at this point there is one router that is configuring its own ip. But still no internet for either computer. Is it possible that the router(s) are destroyed but still showing full connection signals? Anyone have any good routers to recommend for cheap? Ill try a brand new one and just return it if thats not the problem.

[Judas]

the D-link 604's are REAL cheap and pretty excellent with everything.... easy to setup and whatnot as well...

[Serendipity]

A few questions that may help with the troubleshooting.

Are both routers set to work as DHCP servers? Often they come with that setting as standard. Could be a conflict.

All your devices need to have unique IP addresses, but be on the same “logical” network. Normally routers come with an address of 192.168.0.1 and if they both have the same address you need to change one. Then all the other machines should be either set to static addresses in the same range 192.168.0.2 – 192.168.0.255 with a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0 or set to get automatic IP from the DHCP on one of the routers.

Modern routers tend to have web interfaces for playing with the settings. Not sure about Siemens, but with Netgear you just open your web browser and connect to http://192.168.0.1 with default user Admin and password of….. password (duh!).

And as I think Judas mentioned, check that they are real routers and not just hubs or switches.

[CaptinSxb]

Are both routers set to work as DHCP servers? Often they come with that setting as standard. Could be a conflict.

Whats DHCP stand for and should they both be off or one on?

[CaptinSxb]

Its working now thanks for all your help, its was a combination of ip addresses and not being a DHCP server on one of them.