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Answer» Thanks in advance for any help you all can offer me! My COMPUTER info is as follows:
Windows XP service pack 3 (legit copy) with current updates
Processor: AMD Athlon 64 x2
Motherboard: Abit An8 32x
Ram: 2 gigs corsair
Video card: XFX Geforce 7900 GT
HD: 300 GB Western Digital
Wireless router: Linksys WRT54G
DSL Modem: Motorola (not sure of the model number)
Wireless card: Linksys WUSB54GP USB receiver
I apologize if this gets long but I'll provide as much detail as possible.
A few days ago mid-browsing my connection to the internet stopped working. As the other computers in the house are still able to connect, both via ethernet and wirelessly, I have to assume the problem is with my machine.
If I try to "repair" the connection, that window stops responding and will display indefinitely. Same thing happens if I try to disable the wireless connection manually. It will hang, and then after I close it out by ending the task and send the error report to microsoft, it will not enable and comes up with an error message that says it's unable to connect.
I've tried switching USB ports, same problem. I've tried uninstalling the driver in device manager and the window freezes the same way as when I try to disable it. If I restart, it gets stuck on the "windows is shutting down" screen, forcing me to do a hard power down (it doesn't do this if the Linksys USB receiver is unplugged). A few times it's even displayed a BLUE screen of death that says that windows has shut down to prevent damage, citing rdbss.sys as the problem. Upon restarting with the Linksys receiver plugged in, it WILL actually connect to the network and send/receive over the internet for about 30 seconds, then it just stops working. Once this happens, even though it still displays that I'm connected to my wireless connection, not only can I not get out to the internet, I can't ping my router.
I've tried uninstalling the driver in safe mode, and it successfully uninstalled once, but not the next time (I tried again from another USB port), but the same problem persists as soon as I restart and PLUG in the card. I've even tried a backup wireless receiver card, an SMC usb receiver, and it, too, won't connect. It finds the available networks but will not connect. I tried this one on multiple USB ports as well.
I tried to do a system restore to an earlier date, and even though system restore is enabled, there were no checkpoints to restore to. I thought this was odd.
I use AVG for virus protection and Ad Aware AE (active) and Spybot Search & Destroy (scans only) for spyware protection. All turned up CLEAN scans and per a friend's suggestion I downloaded Malwarebytes Anti-Malware and scanned with that as well, again with clean results. All the definition files were up-to-date as I updated them manually after downloading them on another computer. Scandisk reported no errors either.
A friend of mine who is a computer guru suggested that it might be a bad TCP/IP stack. When I googled this, one walkthrough for repairing the stack said to ping 127.0.0.1 and if it comes back as a loss, that's the problem, and if not, it's something else. My ping came back just fine, so I don't know if it's worth it to try to repair the stack or if you all might have some other ideas.
A couple of miscellaneous things that probably have nothing to do with anything: I usually leave the computer running day/night, my hard drive is nearly at capacity with just under 10 gigs free, and my video card has been on the outs for months. I think it's just overheating since it's overclocked as it displays random colored pixels and goes all crazy if I fire up a graphics intensive game. Everything else has been functioning perfectly.
Thanks in advance for any help you might be able to offer. I browsed these forums to see if I could find an answer but I think I need more of a "diagnosis" than can be offered from my just looking at other peoples' past problems. Cheers.
Jeff
Overclocking can cause problems, however I don't think that the problem..
Have you treid the latest drivers from the manufactor? (Linksys)Thanks for the reply.
I have, indeed, tried updating the drivers. It took a bunch of tries just to uninstall the old ones in safe mode, but I don't think it's a simple driver issue as I've tried a different wireless adaptor from a different manufacturer with no luck.
The video card was overclocked from the factory and has been on the outs for the better part of a year so my first thought is that it has nothing to do with what's going on here.
On a side note, I don't think it's a USB issue either, as I'm able to use other devices in the same USB ports just fine (iphone, thumb drive etc.).
JeffQuote DSL Modem: Motorola (not sure of the model number) Get rid of it! @Geek-9pm
Do you really think that would solve it?
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Does the Wireless card work on another computer?Quote from: Ryder17z on October 27, 2009, 04:56:54 AM@Geek-9pm
Do you really think that would solve it?
YES!My cable modem is a Motorola and I've yet to have a single problem with it.
In either case I really don't see how the modem could have any bearing over the wireless connection to the router.
Additionally I might add that this has nothing to do with the TCP stack; TCP works over the connection, but has nothing to do with it being activated/connected.just wondering if the system could be reacting this way due to being over clocked. Have you tried connecting the wireless to a different system? Also, Have you connected your computer directly to the router and or modem?Thanks for the replies.
The adaptor works fine on another computer. I've tried 2 adaptors from 2 different manufacturers. Haven't tried connecting via Ethernet as that wouldn't do any good long term-- I need to connect this particular machine wirelessly.
I did end up doing a reset for the TCP/IP stack... no luck with that either...
Jeffit would let us know if there is an issue with getting out to the internet. have you checked the event viewer to see if there are issues with the system and hardware / software?Quote from: jeffa on October 27, 2009, 06:43:22 PMThanks for the replies.
The adaptor works fine on another computer. I've tried 2 adaptors from 2 different manufacturers. Haven't tried connecting via Ethernet as that wouldn't do any good long term-- I need to connect this particular machine wirelessly.
I did end up doing a reset for the TCP/IP stack... no luck with that either...
Jeff
tried this:
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/winsockxpfix.html
Thanks for all the replies guys, I really appreciate it. I did end up figuring out the problem. Here's the solution for anyone who might come across this topic in a search:
Turned out to be a virus that infects the master boot record, which is why none of the virus or spyware protection programs I used could detect it. I guess I would have needed a root kit cleaner for that. The virus, to the best that I can tell, was win32.mebroot.bz, and the way to get rid of it is to boot off of the Windows XP CD into the Windows recovery console and then run "fixmbr".
I figured it out on a fluke. While I was backing up some of my data on an external hard drive I noticed that in the C:\Documents and Settings folder that two new user accounts were present: "HelpAssistant" and "HelpAssistant.THE-MONSTER". I googled this and eventually found another forum with a topic on the win32.mebroot.bz virus, which creates a HelpAssistant user account and then starts filling the temporary internet files folder. As my hard drive was spinning non-stop and a crashing issue had popped up, I looked at my C: properties I noticed that there were about 6 gigs less room than the day before, and I obviously hadn't downloaded anything large since my connection was dead.
I put 2+2 together, ran fixmbr, deleted the bogus user accounts and that seems to have done the trick. No more hard drive spinning, no more crashes, and my wireless connection is back to functioning perfectly.
Thanks again for the help... I hope this might be useful for anyone else that comes across this topic.Thank you for the information.
Keywords: HelpAssistant, MBR, Virus, Wireless
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