Comments on: How to disconnect from wireless signal?

Question: How to disconnect from wireless signal?

footnote — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 11:00:34 -0800

My LAN won't unconnect from a wireless IP address!

I just got a cable modem. Everything is working properly, but when I plug my Sony laptop in with the ethernet cable, the LAN connection won't register the modem. Instead, it displays a wireless IP address. Any ideas on how to fix this? I'm running Windows XP Professional.

By: delmoi

delmoi — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 11:03:12 -0800

you could try disabling your wireless network card.

By: footnote

footnote — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 11:12:02 -0800

Tried that, didn't work. Is there any way to disable wireless functionality more definitively than clicking "disable," short of removing the card?

By: footnote

footnote — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 11:13:03 -0800

Also (and I have no idea if this makes sense), I'm not sure if the problem is actually the wireless but rather that the LAN thinks it's getting a wireless signal.

By: wzcx

wzcx — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 11:20:51 -0800

reboot, enter the bios, and there may be an option to REALLY disable the wireless card- either by disabling the minipci slot it's in, or by killing the power to the radio. Enter windows normally, and see what happens.

By: ori

ori — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 11:25:16 -0800

What makes you think it's getting a WAN IP address? Some IP addresses (192.168.x.x and 10.2.x.x, for example) are used all over in private LANs. Could be you're getting a similar IP from your Wireless LAN and your Cable modem provider.

It would help if you went to Start -> Run -> "cmd", and typed "ipconfig /all" in the command window. Paste the results here.

By: footnote

footnote — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 11:31:31 -0800

Ori - my ISP tech told me that the IP address was for a wireless connection, and that the address I should be getting from them was different. I don't have my laptop here to perform the operation you've suggested, but I'll do it tomorrow if you can check back!

By: ori

ori — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 13:30:07 -0800

Sure, OK.

By: antifuse

antifuse — Wed, 21 Dec 2005 02:03:16 -0800

I presume you're plugging the laptop right into the cable modem? And not into a router that's plugged into the cable modem?

By: footnote

footnote — Wed, 21 Dec 2005 07:42:58 -0800

Ugh, I forgot to follow your suggestion last night, Ori. Sorry! If you have any patience left for me at all, you can check back here tomorrow.

I'm going to try plan B tonight, which is to use a wireless antenna connected to my USB port and hook up my own new wireless router to the cable modem. In the past I've been able to successfully connect by using a the antenna and a neighbor's open wireless signal, so maybe this will be the solution.

Antifuse - Yes, I'm plugged directly into the modem.

The genesis of the problem may be the configuration I had to perform to connect to my law school's wireless. After a few days of paying no attention whatsoever in class, I decided that I needed to get offline, and I changed the configuration in some way to do that. Now I have no idea what it was that I did...

By: footnote

footnote — Thu, 22 Dec 2005 13:59:28 -0800

Happy ending! My workplace IT person fixed it (I had been shy about asking him because it wasn't really work related, but he offered to help in the end.) As I suspected, the problem was that I had "hard coded" an IP address when I configured my laptop to work on my school's network, and we just needed to reinstall the ethernet card drivers.