Windows – Why can’t I get internet access through WiFi in Windows Vista but I’m able to get it in Linux

limited accesswindows-vistawireless-networkingwireless-router

I can connect to my wireless network just fine on Linux. I can't do so with Windows Vista. Vista recognizes the connection, and it even connects to the router, but there is no internet access. The little network icon in the system tray should show two monitors and a globe, the globe indicating Internet access, but the globe isn't there.

Also, it's not exactly my wireless network, just a network I'm allowed to use and know the password to. I don't expect any problems with the router or the internet service, as other devices (phones, iPad, another laptop with Windows XP, this one with Linux running) work as expected. So the issue is probably with Vista. I ran netsh int ip reset, and that didn't help either.

Best Answer

Are you actually getting an IP address assigned via DHCP on Vista? Start command prompt and run "ipconfig". You want the IP address to start with something other than "169", generally it's going to be 192.168.x.x but it might be 10.x.x.x or rarely 172.x.x.x.

If you have an IP, are you able to ping the router? "ipconfig /all" will give you the router address. The command is "ping 192.168.1.1" and you should get responses rather than timeouts.

Among other things to check in the ipconfig /all results:

  • Is DHCP enabled or is the address static? If static, is it possible that there's another device with the same address? Static IPs may be in the range that DHCP allocates, so you can have conflicts.
  • If you're able to ping the router, did ipconfig /all give you DNS server addresses? Are you able to ping the DNS servers?

UPDATE: Looking back, this was incomplete in that it didn't describe the significance of the 169.* addresses - Devices connecting to a network and requesting an address via DHCP that don't get a response will auto-assign an address starting with 169. When (for example) you have a WiFi-enabled printer that starts in Ad-Hoc network mode you can get it to print out a network configuration page showing the address, then connect to that Ad-Hoc network (generating your own 169.* address), connect to the printer, and configure its network options.

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