Problem with a Windows XP Home computer with APIPA Address

I am helping a friend with a fairly new Dell with Windows XP Home. He cannot get on the Internet. With his computer at my house on my home network I still can't get it on the net. With TCP/IP set to "Obtain an IP Address Automatically" this computer gets configured with an APIPA address. If I take the Ethernet cable out of the NIC on this computer and put it into the NIC of a Pentium II computer running Windows 2000Pro, the 2000Pro configures to the network just fine and gets on the Internet with no problem. I have no problem getting proper addresses automatically with any other computer on the network.

Of course, I can't ping anything with the Dell hooked up except 127.0.0.1. It passes that test. When I configure the settings to 192.168.10.10, for instance, I can ping the other 4 computers on my network and they can ping it. I can also ping a Web Site such as trendmicro.com when I enter the IP address but I can't ping them, or anybody else, by their name.

I have deleted and reinstalled the NIC drivers. I haven't tried a new NIC. I bought Spy Doctor, put the downloaded file on the network and from there, installed it on the Dell. Spy Doctor removed, like, 1700 infections. I installed AVG and removed a few viruses. I installed registry Mechanic and repaired a couple hundred registry errors. By the way there are no restore points.

I wonder, do I need to do a reinstall? There are a lot of you out there who know a heck of a lot more about it than I do, but personally, I would think a reinstall might be inevitable.

I'd appreciate any input before I go to the nuclear option.

Thank you for listening to my sordid tale.

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Comments

mwgood

On one of the working machines - you can run the command ipconfig /all from a command prompt and get the address of the DNS Servers and the gateway address.

Assign the address on the problematic machine just as you did before, only this time, enter the DNS server IPs manually.

elathrop

The DNS server on my other machines come up the same as the Gateway, 192.168.10.1. Entering it in manually doesn't help. Thanks, though, I should have explained that.

royal

Spyware found, virus' found, and hundreds of registry errors? You definitely need to do a fresh install before you proceed with anything else. In all honesty, there are so many virus' out there that hide themselves properly from antivirus and lots of virus' spread like crazy. With all the issues found using antivirus/spyware, it's a given that there are hidden infestations lurking on your system undetected. Like I said, I would definitely re-install before you proceed with anything else. When you first boot up, I'd start changing your passwords to online accounts, especially if you bank online or other sensitive information you have submitted to other locations.

Danman32

Assuming you get the malware issues cleared up, try a winsock reset:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/811259/en-us

I usually go for the method normally used for pre SP2. The Netsh method doesn't always do the job.

KGhaleon

A clean install would definately work, but you could always just try repairing the operating system first. I would definately use a WinSock fix if your just getting a bogus APIPA address. It's worked many times for me.

Check your event viewer logs and see if there's anything suspicious related to DNS. My DNS settings were wrong once and I got some weird blackhole addresses.

RussS

I would suggest that if the system is compromised enough to have hundreds of registry errors then a fresh reload would be the best option.

keatron

I would have to agree with icroyal and Russ on this. Otherwise you might spend days or weeks trying to get to the bottom of it whereas a reload will take you about an hour. Not to mention if there's a bunch of trojans there, you probably should again consider changing all of your account logons (where possible) and passwords. In a nutshell, the tcp/ip configuration errors should be the least of your concerns right now.

elathrop

The Winsock rebuild worked and I couldn't be happier! Thank you DANMAN32 and everyone else for your help. Actually, I got somewhat close. On Microsoft I found the TCP/IP protocol reset. Obviously, that wasn't it but I tried. While following along with the Winsock rebuild, it showed that the NETBIOS section was missing. How about that for adding up!

Right now my position is this: The computer is working very well. I was able to keep plugging away and get rid of the other annoyances like popup alerts for "programs not found" and "no RUNDLL" and stupid stuff like that.

Though the computer belongs to a friend of mine, I will advise him that his social security and credit card numbers may now have a larger viewing audience than reruns of "Cheers" but he has about 20 gigs of JPEGs and other files he would like to keep, so if he wants a fresh install he can backup his files himself and I'll do a fresh install for him.

If it was my computer, I'd save everything to a hard drive across my network and do a reinstall, but in this case, the Winsock rebuild was the perfect solution. I gained valuable experience and he is responsible for his own files.

Once again, I am most grateful for Techexams and the friendly, helpful and very smart folks I meet on it.

KGhaleon

I don't know how many times winsock as saved me in the past. Though once I examined a customer's TCP/IP settings and realized that their incoming/outgoing ports had been set to deny all. Seeing how you could still ping using a static address, I would assume that's not the case.

KG

Danman32

elathrop wrote:

Though the computer belongs to a friend of mine, I will advise him that his social security and credit card numbers may now have a larger viewing audience than reruns of "Cheers"

That's funny!

Just note, when you do a winsock reset, third party hooks into the network stack for stuff like security, proxy or web filtering probably will be lost and the third party product may need a reinstall.