<p>On the tails of ImpZeps uncovering of Worst Buys computer scam…DD purchased a Toshiba laptop from Best Buy last August. The computer had been great until March. At that time, the DD began to have difficulty with internet access ONLY in the BU DORMS. She is unable to gain internet access via a LAN cable in all dorms. The internet connects fine (of course) when she goes to student computer services for help and they won’t even listen to the rest of her problem and send her away. She has had the same response from the Geek Squad. She also took the computer to an authorized Toshiba dealer who quickly plugged in a LAN cable, declared that the internet worked fine and charged her $50 and told her that if it was a hardware problem that the svc. call would have been free. The wireless still worked fine anywhere. Since wireless modems are “illegal” in dorms, she is unable to use the internet access for which she pays. Any suggestions outside of “get a new computer”? </p>
<p>She has completely dumped the hard drive on the computer, adjusted sensitivities, etc. Nothing has ever worked.</p>
<p>Your daughter’s laptop doesn’t connect to the school’s network from her dorm room. It does connect when she goes to the student computer center or to a repair facility. </p>
<p>I’m guessing that when she went to the student computer center, she didn’t take her Ethernet cable with her. Has she tried another cable? Have your daughter use her roommate’s cable to see if she can connect to the network.</p>
<p>Since the techs had no problem logging your daughter’s laptop onto the network, there’s no indication of a hardware problem. That only leaves the cable she is using… </p>
<p>By the way, CC has just introduced a computer section under College Life. You’ll get a faster response to your question there.</p>
<p>if the internet connects but she’s not getting anything it may be connected using the wrong ip address…check the networks ip and the one that your daughters computer is connecting to</p>
<p>DD has done all of this and a lot more. She is actually decent with computers. Has used roommates LAN cables, changed the sensitivity speed on connection, correct IP address, etc,etc,etc, etc, and etc. She had the ResNet staff come into the dorm to show them the problem and they don’t have anything to offer. I will check out that computer connection section! thanks</p>
<p>If your daughter’s laptop can connect to the school network at the computer center, there’s no indication of a hardware or IP address problem. Her Ethernet cable is not an issue. </p>
<p>I presume when she went to the school’s computer services department, her laptop connected to the school network and asked for her username/password? Does her school have WiFi hotspots on campus? Can she connect and logon?</p>
<p>Back at her dorm room, what kind of error messages did she get? “No network found?” “Unable to connect…?” </p>
<p>As a test, she could delete and re-install her network adaptor drivers: control panel, system, hardware, device manager, right click on network adaptor and select delete. Reboot the laptop and allow it to re-install the network drivers from Windows XP. You’ll see messages on the lower right corner of the screen during the process. Just let it run and reboot the computer when it tells you. </p>
<p>Go back to the control panel and use the network setup wizard to install the school’s network settings.</p>
<p>From your description it doesn’t sound like there’s anything wrong with the laptop.</p>
<p>Many dorms won’t allow any old system to just connect - they require a particular setup on the computer in order to authenticate. If another computer plugged her ethernet port in the dorm room works okay and if her cable works okay elsewhere, then it sounds as if her problem might be with the authentication/setup. Resnet should be able to figure this out.</p>
<p>I suggest she take another shot at following their setup directions again. If they have her configure a proxy server in her browser try pinging it from a command line is possible (if she doesn’t know what to do with this Resnet s/b trying this). She can try contacting Resnet again and hope she gets a different person to help her. Another thought - try to find CS or CSEE major to take a look at it and help her.</p>
<p>Thanks to all of you computer gurus. I plan to call BU myself on Monday. I have let her handle this on her own till now, but am disappointed that she paid the Resnet fee and has not been able to use it. She said that most of the kids who have helped her have been like “Sam the Computer Guy” types that mostly insulted her and then skated around the issue when they couldn’t obtain a connection. We’ll see how it goes. Computer waranty runs out Aug. 15…so if it is a computer problem…time is running out. Since the wireless connection works fine all over campus, I have been tempted to tell her to just obtain a wireless router for her room. She is not willing to risk getting into trouble with that one since routers are not allowed. I will let you guys know how it goes.</p>
<p>Laptop cannot connect to the network in any of her school’s dorms.
Laptop WiFi works fine.
Laptop connects at Computer Services via Ethernet. </p>
<p>Her laptop’s hardware is good.
Her network setup works in WiFi mode.
Her network LAN settings work at Computer Services.
Her network settings must be good in order to connect at Computer Services…
The hardware is the same and the LAN settings are the same. Why do we have two polar opposite results?</p>
<p>Experiment of the day: If your daughter’s roommate has a Windows laptop, have your daughter create a new network connection on her roommate’s computer using the “Network Wizard”. Give the new connection a name like BUTEST and use your username and password. Make that the default LAN connection and see if you can log onto the network. This would be the equivalent of buying a new laptop. </p>
<p>In theory, this should not work. Student logins and settings should all be the same except for your username and password. If she connects, then something is wrong in the network settings on her laptop which I don’t believe is the case (since she can make a connection at Computer Services). </p>
<p>A very, very long shot may be that her username is the same as someone else at school. This would be very unlikely. I wonder what changed in March to make her connection flaky. Someone in the IT chain may need to verify that there are no conflicts with another student…</p>
<p>What are the consequences if she’s found with a wireless router? My guess would be: “stop using that.” If there’s more teeth to the consequence than that, no, don’t do it… but otherwise, oh why the heck not?</p>
<p>My guess is that the dorm network is actually a different network than the network elsewhere on campus, and that something is wrong within the dorm network. I would suggest that she find out who the administrator for the dorm network is, and contact them directly, not computer services.</p>
<p>michuncle- good idea. I will have her try this when she picks her computer up from the amazing service center where she burned up 50 bucks this week. Thank you all for the free! advice with realistic solutions.</p>