Could it be the CAT 5 cable?

[TBKahuna123]

Sounds like a good deduction. It's amazing how fast these things can spread. in this case though, it was most likely a king of denial of service attack. The infected computer was trying to infect the others, but your anti-spyware/virus stuff was blokcing it. This can overload a net connection if it comes too fast and can act like a DS attack.

I hate to say, I hadn't thought of that until now, but I did go through that a few years ago with an outbreak of MyDoom on my coporate network. Nasty nasty stuff, all becasue our VP had to see a picture of Paris HIlton's ass.

 

[midwestyankee]

Sounds like a good deduction. It's amazing how fast these things can spread. in this case though, it was most likely a king of denial of service attack. The infected computer was trying to infect the others, but your anti-spyware/virus stuff was blokcing it. This can overload a net connection if it comes too fast and can act like a DS attack.

I hate to say, I hadn't thought of that until now, but I did go through that a few years ago with an outbreak of MyDoom on my coporate network. Nasty nasty stuff, all becasue our VP had to see a picture of Paris HIlton's ass.

Maybe yes, maybe no.

I'm back to encountering the same problem when I connect my laptop to the home network. I get bounced periodically from messenger and time and time again I get timeout messages when trying to load new pages in Lit or other sites.

I've noticed one thing that may be a hint to the problem and that is that very often the disconnects from yahoo (and possibly the network as a whole) happen when I am typing a post to a forum. In fact, a disconnect just happened while I was typing this reply. This makes me wonder if there might be a keylogger on my laptop that my spyware programs aren't picking up.

Now what?

 

[Bert Notorius]

I would have your ISP replace the cable modem. You've stated the problem is not specific to just the laptop. The router is new. The problem does not follow the laptop to a different provider. It seems unlikely that spyware could suck enough bandwidth to stop all communication. Other network computers have demonstrated the same behavior. The narrow point is either the router, the modem, the cable to the pole or the ISP itself.

 

[skeptic99]

I have not read all posts...so if this has been mentioned please ignore.

I have a set up with a cable modem (broadband) going to a router...then to my various outlets via Cat5, as well as wireless. All irrelevant.

When I play internet poker and start getting disconnects I go down and unplug my modem and router, plug the modem back in until it stabalizes (a minute or two), plug the router back in...and everything is high speed again.

Works all the time. Essentially a cold reboot to purge whatever is in the caches. Shouldn't have to do this...but so far that is all that works for me.

 

[TBKahuna123]

Hmm.....

I assume you have cleaned the laptop? If all the other computers are working, I'm back to thinking it's the network adapter in the laptop. Unfortunately, that's not really an easy fix.

What you might do though it check the box on your network connection that displays a network icon in your systray. Then watch the icon. When you get dropped, check to see if your connection shows disconnected. If you get disconnected then it reconnects, it should show that as well. That will at least tell y ou if it's a network issue as a whole(which I'm betting it is) or just messenger or your browser.

 

[hard_N_uncut]

Make sure you have security features active on your wireless router. (WEP) I have seen where unprotected routers were used by people's neighbors and their connections were slow. If your router/modem activity light is almost steady, its a possibility.

 

[midwestyankee]

Make sure you have security features active on your wireless router. (WEP) I have seen where unprotected routers were used by people's neighbors and their connections were slow. If your router/modem activity light is almost steady, its a possibility.

Thanks for the warning, but we have a wired LAN so I don't think this should be a problem.

 

[Horny_Husband]

Update:

I spent more time tonight using yahoo messenger and my browser using two different nodes in our home network. From both nodes (so, using two different cables), I ran into the same problems of random disconnects.

Since this problem appears to happen from more than one location at home, it's hard to suspect cables. Next on my list will be the hardware. I wonder if the router (though it's quite new) might need updated firmware.

Any ideas here based on this new information?

I just ran into this problem with the Router's WAN port on a Linksys router. The internal LAN components worked just fine. I started running ping -t commands and saw it kept dropping. Did some talking with ISP made some changes based on their recommendations.

Ended up putting in a new router and cased closed.

 

[Horny_Husband]

Midwestyankee,
There is the ouside possibility of your Cat5 cables experiencing Electromagnetic Interference od some sort.Unshielded Cat 5 or Cat 6 for that matter can b especially suceptible to this EMI.In that you have several such Cat 5 cables
wired throughout your home,it could be case of these cables passing too near a
bathroom exhaust fan or some other appliance with an electric motor powering it.I had one customer who had such a case and the culprit here was of all things
his refrigerator running the automatic icemaker.This "gremlin" was especially difficult to track down,but after eliminating everything else,we did catch the icemaker "redhanded" in causing this EMI disruption.Relocating the cable further away from the refrigerator solved the problem.
I am going to concur on your upgrading the firmware on the router and will also suggest you look through the support database for this particular model router to see if other owners of this router are having the same difficulty.Also running a search on that Manufacturer and Model Number in some of the bigger search engines may also be revealing as others having the same difficulty with this model router will appear on support forums and the like and this will often reveal a solution.

I thought the same thing until I saw the post saying it was different cable drops.

 

[fiberguyca]

This may help...I don't know for sure.
Is the modem located close to where your ISP service enters your home or close to one of the pc's? You only use a normal phone cable to connect from the wall outlet to the modem, then run a Cat5 or 6 cable to the pc's via a router and/or switch. It's been suggested to me that because you only use 1 pair of wires in the phone cable, this length of cable should be as short as possible. You use all 4 pairs in the Cat5/6 cable between the modem and pc, so therefore it will work better to have this as the longer cable.

If you have a multitester with fine tips, you might be able to at least test the cable for continuity. Looking into the end of the plugs, the order is Brown/Whitebrown, Orange/whiteBlue, Blue/whiteOrange, Green/whiteGreen. This applies to most of the world. The US may swap the Orange and Green pairs. If you can pass a current through the wires, your continuity is there.

If all this fails, make friends with your building's electrical contractor who probably has a data division that may be able to help you test your cabling. They may also have a lanmeter that will determine if the network is ill or if you need a NIC card

 

[midwestyankee]

Fiberguyca, thanks for stopping by with some ideas. We get our internet connection through a cable service so the integrity of our phone line is not pertinent. Also, this problem has been happening in a single-family house rather than an office or apartment building.

As a quick update, shortly after TBK's latest post here I made the configuration changes that he suggested there. While I haven't used my messenger app much over the last few days, it seemed as if the disconnect problem had been neutralized.

I'm not convinced that the war is over, but we'll see how things go now that the holidays are over and our internet usage returns to normal.