"The Strange Case of Claire's Laptop" Topic

Editor Claire has been on vacation, where she used her laptop and a portable wi-fi hotspot.

Now, she is home, using her regular internet broadband connection. Her system is slow, internet speed is down, and she can't connect to TMP (gets a "could not connect…" error).

She has run a "quick" virus check (nothing found), and is now running the long version of the virus check.

Any ideas?

Does she have it on airplane mode?
If so turn it off.

Call her internet provider and ask them to check her connection?

Does she have "Ignore" turned on?

Funny…..

Does she have it on airplane mode?

No

Call her internet provider and ask them to check her connection?

They'll send a tech out, but it may take a few days, and she doesn't want to lose time from work.

Has her wi-fi hotspot been hacked? She should go into it and change the password & security settings.

Is TMP the only site she can't access?

Has her wi-fi hotspot been hacked? She should go into it and change the password & security settings.

She's not using it now.

Is TMP the only site she can't access?

Yes, but it might be just because her internet speed is so incredibly slow now. But she can get Facebook (but not always the pictures).

Unit 61398?

Has she cleaned out her cookies and Temp internet files, also look at her startup programs and take out any unneeded programs. Also make sure she still has space on her hard drive. Have her shut down any programs running in the background like iTunes.

Getting FaceBook slowly sounds like a limited bandwidth problem. Not getting TMP sounds like a firewall.

First disable the local firewall as a diagnostic. If that doesn't fix it re-enable. (If it does add TMP to the whitelist.)

Try the WiFi hotspot again. If it works then it's unlikely to be malware, more likely a problem with her home Internet connection.

Could be physical connection problem. Check the LAN cable, use a substitute if possible. (Make sure the lights are green in the Ethernet jacks.)

Clear any TCP/IP routing in memory by turning off the WiFi on the laptop. Also try DHCP release / renew on the physical LAN adapter.

If not is a housemate downloading something large like a video? If no, does the housemate have the same problem going to the same sites?

If yes, does the ISP account have a bandwidth cap and have they hit it? The ISP may be throttling the session.

If none of this reboot.

If still not fixed, power cycle the Internet router.

Check the Internet router's DNS server (not the laptop's which probably has the router for its DNS server). Use NSLookup to reach TMP; if disallowed the ISP may have blacklisted TMP. Contact the ISP to clear; in the meantime in the laptop's settings try a different DNS server known to allow TMP (in the US we can use Google's public DNS which is 8.8.8.8).

Has she tried turning it off and on again?

Pete for the win.

Could be malware/spyware that is slowing her down. DL and check with something like Malware Bytes and try again. Often the virus scanner will not pick up spyware.

It's Tango's fault, or the ignorers, or the haters, or john the ofm, or the lovers, or the cia, or the fbi, or the abc, or the illuminate, or orvell the duck.

The problem has mysteriously gone away…

mysterious? The (insert your favorite agency/organization) realized that they were compromised and made other "arrangements".

Could be malware/spyware that is slowing her down. DL and check with something like Malware Bytes and try again.

Wow, she ran the scan, and I have never seen so many problems found!!!

Wow, she ran the scan, and I have never seen so many problems found!!!

Then you haven't seen my wife's laptop after she's cruised the 'net for a couple of months. Oh yeah, teach the Lady Editors how to run a scan. Scan with more than one tool. I still use Spybot S&D.

Wow, she ran the scan, and I have never seen so many problems found!!!

It's usually tracking cookies that it finds but there can be a lot of worse stuff too. Hopefully it helped her issues.

And "out in the wild" of the Far East no telling who was on that computer

Did they install anything that caused the issue

Hoorah laptop membership drive averted

Wow!

Glad to hear her laptop is on the road to recovery.

So apparently the way this works in some Third World countries: if they want you to pay your bill, they throttle your internet connection until you come in and give them money. (Cheaper than sending a bill in the mail!)

I was right!!!

Though why my post was deleted is a mystery. Perhaps this will go the same way?

Though why my post was deleted is a mystery. Perhaps this will go the same way?

When a post is deleted, the posts which commented on that post are also deleted (or snipped, if possible).

That explains a lot. Thanks.