Question/problem for internet networking doods

I have an SMC wireless router. Everything works on it fine, and worked on it fine last year when I had cable internet.
Since I got internet 2 days ago, I have had problems connecting more than 1 computer to it. I have 2 wireless laptops on the network and 1 pc (which connects through cat5) If I reset the router and the modem, and turn a computer on, the computer works fine. However, if another computer is turned on at the same time, I lose connection completely, not just speed.
Like I said, last year, everything worked fine and I really didn't lose speed. I have updated my router and that hasn't seemed to work.



Thanks all

Could you specify exactly what you mean by 'since I got internet 2 days ago'. What connection did you get ?

It sounds like you're having some sort of conflict, what ip addressing do you use ? I'm not a wireless chap (tfs will definetely help you out with this question) but some providers don't like you to have a LAN, so they bind only one MAC id to the connection.. I don't know if thats relevant to your setup, but it might be.

As I said, Tfs is our resident wi-fi guy so he's probably better equipped to help you with this one.


Cheers,

I haven't used the SMC wireless box myself, but what type of setup do you have?

First of all, you mention that you were connected by cable internet before and now you are connect to the internet. You were before also. I assume by this statement that you are not connected by DSL.

Is this correct?

If this is correct, then you will have a modem, just like you did before - it is just that one was a cable modem and one was a DSL modem.

I also assume you have a private address for the WAN side, something akin to 24.15.200.5. On the LAN side you would be NAT'd. So that all your machines should have something like 192.168.120.5, 192.168.120.7, etc.

If this is the case, the fact that you are connected by cable vs DSL, makes no difference.

There is a problem with some Modems, in that you cannot change devices that are connected to your modem (even with the same IP address) as some modems look at both your IP address and MAC address (which will be different on each machine). This is probably not your problem.

You say that one computer can access the internet fine. As soon as you turn on a 2nd machine, you lose connection completely. First of all:

1) do you lose connection with both machines?

2) do you lose connection with just the internet? In otherwords, can you ping one machine from the other and vice versa?

3) can you ping the router? I assume the router is something like 192.168.10.1. If this is the case, can both machines ping the router?

4) are both machines the wireless machines or is one of the machines the directly connected machine.

5) is WEP disabled as well as MAC filtering? I would turn this off while testing to make sure this is not causing a problem.

6) is the same problem happening regardless which 2 machines you use?

This sounds more like an internal network problem and less an internet problem. As Sahirh, it sounds like a conflict issue. I would make sure you can talk to all the internal machine (ping each machines) before I tried to even deal with the internet (which you may have done, I don't know - just thowing out normal testing procedures to find out what circumstances can be ruled out).

Do IPCONFIG on all your machines to make sure they are set the way you think they are. I don't know how many times I have been ready to throw my computer through the window, only to find out I had the wrong IP address. Assumptions can be killer.

If you can't figure it out from this, give us the configurations of all the machines and router and we will see what we can do.

Sorry for the vague references to my setup.
To start off, let me tell you that I just got cable internet 2 days ago. Last year while at school, I had the same ISP for cable internet as I do now. Same setup and all.

I have my Toshiba cable modem plugged into my wireless SMC7004vwbr router. I have 1 PC that is CAT5'ved from the router to the PC. I have 2 laptops which are wireless 802.211. As I stated before, I had this same setup with the same router and same cable company last year. This is the problem though: I can rule out the cable company; its something wrong with my router (or ip addys)

let me answer your q's

1) do you lose connection with both machines?
Yeah, once I start the 2nd computer, the first one slows down and THEN both shut off completely. The only way to make the network work is rebooting the router.


2) do you lose connection with just the internet? In otherwords, can you ping one machine from the other and vice versa?
I haven't tried and can't right now because I have my pc plugged straight into the modem (the only way it can work consistenly). But I do believe that there is still connectivity, just not to the internet.


3) can you ping the router? I assume the router is something like 192.168.10.1. If this is the case, can both machines ping the router?
Once again, Im not sure, but I believe they can, just no internet connectivity.

4) are both machines the wireless machines or is one of the machines the directly connected machine.
One is directly connected and 2 are wireless. It doesn't matter which order they are turned on; the outcome is still the same.

5) is WEP disabled as well as MAC filtering? I would turn this off while testing to make sure this is not causing a problem.
Could you explain how you do this?

6) is the same problem happening regardless which 2 machines you use?
No different.




Thanks alot for your time guys.

told you to come here oltouch

OK, so now I have my modem plugged into my router, and im on my PS that is connected with CAT5. Everything is working fine. I'm afraid to turn on another computer though.