Airport connectivity issue

[Clark C]

I am working at a small office where we have three computers. We have a D-Link wireless router that transmits to the two powerbooks with airport cards. The iMac is connected manually through an ethernet out of the wireless router. This afternoon when I tried to use the internet on one of the powerbooks, it didn't work. I have been trying to get it working for and hour and a half with no luck. It tells me that XXX.XXX.X.XXX in use by X:X:X:Xf:dX, DHCP Server XXX.XXX.X.X. (The X's are numbers, I am not sure if I should reveal them publicly though) I have tried every setting in the system prefs and can't get anything to work. Any ideas. The bars are all filled, so it is getting the signal fine. The airport in the system prefs is yellow and says "AirPort is connected to the network default. Airport does not have an IP address and connot connect to the Internet."

Help! Thanks for any tips you have. I've fixed this problem before, but it's not working this time.

Clark

 

[jtgotsjets]

In system prefs, have you tried just going to "Network" and then clicking "Assist me"? Its usually pretty good about helping you out, but I'm not sure that's the problem at all.

Another good thing to try is toturn the router off, wait 5 seconds, then back on. This has solved any problems I've had with my D-Link wireless router.

 

[seamuskrat]

It sounds like a DHCP conflict. its possible someone else is using your connection wirelessly and a limited number of DHCP IP addresses are used up. Often, someone will use up an IP address leaving you high and dry.

In the DLink go to the web based control panel, and increased the number of client machines. Reboot router.

Youshould make sure you have security as well. Hide the SSID and add a password at the least.

 

[603]

IP address conflicts

yes, it is probably a DHCP conflict as mentioned by the member above. DHCP stands for Dynamic Hosts Connection Protocol, which translates in English to, "a router hands out IP addresses sequentially (10.0.1.2, 10.0.1.3, 10.0.1.4, etc) when computers try to access the network."

to be more specific....

1) if any of the machines have gone to sleep lately, they might have lost their lease on the IP address and it could have been grabbed by another machine. sometimes if the computer is asleep for a while, the router will re-possess the IP address for distribution and then hand it out when another machine comes onto the network. the sleeping computer, if awakened, will still try to hold on to the old IP address, which has been handed out to some other computer, and basically the router is no longer aware that the sleeping computer is on the network at all.

2) the same thing could have happened if your power blinked for a second and the router was reset. either the router needs to be properly power-cycled (turned off for approximately 15 seconds and then rebooted) or the computers are still holding on to IP addresses that belong to the other computers, i.e. the iMac is holding onto 10.0.1.2 when the router wants to give it 10.0.1.3, and one of the PowerBooks is holding onto 10.0.1.4 but the router wants to give it 10.0.1.2, etc.

in any case, you should be able to solve the problem by:

- disabling your Airport/Ethernet connections on all three machines
- power-cycling the router and letting it reboot fully (shouldn't take more than a minute)
- re-enabling the Airport/Ethernet connections on each computer one by one (the order is not important)

the router, if it's working properly, should hand out IP addresses as new machines come onto the network. for example if the iMac connects, it will probably get 10.0.1.2. then you enable the net connection on a PowerBook, and the router adds it as 10.0.1.3, etc.

 

[Clark C]

603- Thanks, I will try that. If it works, not only did you help me, but I learned something. I love how I took a required class dealing with computer systems and they don't teach us practical stuff like this. Does anybody know of a good website where I can learn how all of this stuff works? I have a decent understanding of much of it, but not enough to know the greater ideas so I can problem solve. Thanks again.