[s373n]

I bought my youngest son a used Dell Optiplex GX240 with XP Home for his personal use. The shop that I purchased it from had purged all the old stuff from the system and tested it in my presence prior to the purchase.

My eldest son wanted to get it up and running for his little brother, so after I had everything hooked up away they went. Something went wrong and the computer can not find an internet connection and gives error messages when I try to rectify the problem.

I took it back to the shop I had purchased it from and the tech played with it for sometime. He eventually pulled the hard drive and switched it with another to show me it was a configuration problem on mine and not the hardware as the drive from the other Optiplex off the shelf connected just fine. He said that my son had likely set Windows up to look for a modem (which it couldnt find) rather than automatically connecting through the network card to the homes router. He said I would need to do a reinstall.

Is this correct?

Is there anything else I can do?

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Howdy and welcome to GTG:

Try the following before you do anything as drastic as a re-install.

1: Go into Control Panel and click on Internet Options.

2: Once in Internet Options, click on the Connections tab.

3: Click on Setup and follow the prompts.

Holler back if you have any problems.

Murray

[Murray S.]

Howdy and welcome to GTG:

Try the following before you do anything as drastic as a re-install.

1: Go into Control Panel and click on Internet Options.

2: Once in Internet Options, click on the Connections tab.

3: Click on Setup and follow the prompts.

Holler back if you have any problems.

Murray

[s373n]

My apologies. It looks as though they have already tried reinstall as it is booting in setup mode and when I hit F3 to quit it says setup is not complete. Cant blame them for trying I suppose.

I will give setup a try myself. Is there anything I should know, or a link to a good `how to`??

[s373n]

BTW, there is no data on there that needs/needed saving.

[s373n]

I am running repair off of the XP disc right now. I will see what happens.

[s373n]

Under network connections it says the network cable is unplugged. Checked the cable by connecting with another computer and it was fine.

Something else I should be looking for?

[s373n]

Says the device is working properly...

[Murray S.]

What says the Device is working properly?

Is there anything in Device Manager that has a yellow or red mark beside it?

Murray

[s373n]

Under network settings, I double click `local area connection 2` and then hit `configure`.....In that window it says `device is working properly`..

There are no yellow or red marks beside any icon in device manager.

[Murray S.]

Good.. Now did you do what I asked in my first post to you?

On the Connections Page, is there anything listed in the dial-up box?

You do connect via broadband correct? Are you using a good CAT5 cable?

Murray

[s373n]

Nothing in the dial-up box.

Cable is good. Tested it on my other computer.

[Murray S.]

Good.. Now did you do what I asked in my first post to you?

What about this?

Did you enable DHCP in the network connection?

Can you copy and paste what it says under "Modems" and "Network Adaptors" in Device Manager.

Murray

[s373n]

I did go through the connection set-up wizard without changing anything from its default settings. At the end when MSN tries to connect it cant.

DHCP has not come up. Where do I enable that?

There is no modem in device manager.

Under network adapters it says:

3Com 3C920 Integrated Fast Ethernet Controller (3C905C-TX Compatible)

[s373n]

And yes, broadband through a router.

Two desktops and a wireless notebook currently working with no problems on connection.

[Murray S.]

Try plugging this system directly into the modem rather than going through the router.

Does it work now?

Murray