Sporadic Network Connection

Up until a couple days ago my home network and Internet access were all working great; Then I decided to get rid of Ubuntu on my HP desktop and have Vista Home Premium x64 as my only OS. Needless to say, that involved a host of problems, including reinstalling Vista just to get the stupid Vista boot loader back. Vista is up and running again, service pack 2 and all updates installed. Yet the network connection is being.... strange. After much tinkering and getting help online, I thought I had solved it... all my computers are talking again and happily chatting away with the Internet. Yet the HP in question doesn't stay that way. Here are my symptoms:
1. Browsers cannot connect to web pages (both latest versions of Firefox 3 and IE 8)
2. Network connection icon on taskbar remains blue, as if connection is great, yet nothing happens when I hover over it or click on it
3. Trying to open up "Network and Sharing Center" through the control panel freezes Windows
4. Trying to access other computers on my network from my HP gives me the "Network path not found" error. Cannot access HP through the other computers, either.
5. Perhaps unrelated, but computer won't restart - I must fully shut it down, then manually turn it back on. When trying to restart, the computer shuts down normally, then the power stays on the tower, the light indicating hard drive access flashes, yet there is no image on the monitor.

Everything works fine for about 20 minutes after turning the computer on, then these symptoms appear, so I don't think its my firewall or anything like that - I'm using Kaspersky Internet Security 2009, BTW. My other computers are running different versions of XP, and they have no problems whatsoever. Virus scan turns up negative. I found similar threads, but nothing completely addressing my problems - I tried those solutions, too, with no luck. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

I am having the same sort of problem as angelxero above.

My old computer was a P4 about 3 1/2 yrs old running XP and I wanted to upgrade particularly for doing home video.

My new computer arrived on 8th May with Vista Home Premium 32 bit.

On 15th May the Tech guy arrived and set up the wireless network with the old computer in another room using a TP-Link modem router (TD-W8920G).

Everything worked well for a while but then I lost the internet connection on 17th June.

On the 19th June the Tech guy visited again and fixed all the settings in the modem/router which he seemed to think had been corrupted by Vista. He explained that Vista concentrates heavily on security and he will not have it on his own computer untill they fix all the problems. He will only use XP. Not very encouraging I thought! I had XP for 3 1/2 yrs and had NO PROBLEMS at all!!!!! Now all this with Vista.

Anyway, all went well for a few days until I couldn't connect with the internet again!!!! But I noticed that if I switch off and on or log off and on again or various combinations of the two, it will eventually connect again. Sometimes it needs up to 5 processes before it works again. I don't recall seeing that anywhere in Microsoft's advertising.

I really am fed up with the whole thing.

Can anyone help please?

Phil.

Ok, I can't really explain it.... but my problems appear to be solved. All I did was download and run Advanced SystemCare 3, and it's working fine now. Must have been problems with the registry or conflicting OS settings. Maybe you should try it, Amazed. It may work, and it certainly won't hurt anything; I've been using it on all my computers for years (starting with version 1) and never had any problems with it. Though I am surprised that it fixed my issues.

angelxero,

Thanks for the suggestion - I downloaded Advanced SystemCare 3 and did the scan and fix so hope that will sort things out for me too. I haven't switched off the computer since then so will see how things are in the morning.

Phil