I Suck At Network Troubleshooting

a week ago today, my father-in-law received his father's day present... a new computer. whether it's my genetic disposition or my mad skills with my playstation 2, i was in charge of setting up the new computer. (apparently, that is my designated role... computer stuff.)

anyway, last week i could not get the computer to connect to the internet. the computer was recognizing the router. unfortunately, the router was not connecting to the internet. as i ran out of time last week, i had to leave the computer with its networking problems... until i could look further into the problem.

so today, i finally had the chance to visit my father-in-law to continue with the network troubleshooting. i suck at network troubleshooting. with ample time at my disposal today, i figured i would start from scratch. i would uninstall everything i did last week and attempt to set up the computer again.

needless to say, after installing the applications from the setup discs, the exact same symptom was occurring: the computer was connecting to the router; the router was not connecting to the internet. i logged into the router through the generic ip address to view its settings... everything with the router looked good... except for the fact that it was not connecting to the internet.

so finally, i had to break down and call verizon, who provide the dsl service to my father-in-law. i must say... that was the biggest waste of time. the verizon representative basically had me power cycle the router numerous times (power cycling is the fancy term for turning the thing off... and then turning it back on.) i had to try numerous locations throughout my father-in-law's place because the verizon representative thought the phone jack was the cause of the problem. (the router kept indicating that it could not connect to the internet at the various locations.)

after a long while, the router miraculously indicated it could connect to the internet at one of the previous locations. so from there, the verizon representative transferred me to their network specialist. i must say... that was an even bigger waste of time. even though the router could now connect to the internet, my father-in-law's computer could still not connect to the internet via the router.

luckily, i had my laptop with me. i used my laptop to connect to the router and everything appeared to be working fine. the verizon network specialist sent me a link so that i could share my laptop with him so that he could diagnose the problem. well, the verizon network specialist took over my laptop and went to view the router settings. the router settings looked good.

then, the verizon network specialist suggested something that totally annoyed me. because he did not have an answer as to why my father-in-law's computer could not connect to the internet via the router whereas my laptop could, he asked me to google a solution with my laptop.

i think the reason why that suggestion annoyed me so much is because i could have done that a long while ago and not wasted almost three hours of my time with the power cycling, the computer sharing, etc. i could have used my laptop from the beginning and jump on someone else's network to google an answer. i assumed it would be quicker to contact a verizon representative who was familiar with their own network. apparently, had i known the network specialist was just going to tell me to google the answer, i would not have even bothered to contact them.

needless to say, i thanked the verizon network specialist for his time. in all honesty, i think "network specialist" may be the wrong title for this verizon representative.

anyway, with the lack of help received from verizon and the wasted amount of time spent with verizon, i decided to simply "play" around with my father-in-law's computer and its network settings. i should have trusted myself and done this earlier because it took me no time to actually get the computer up and running. the computer now connects to the internet via the router.

afterwards, i had a quick training session with my father-in-law on how to connect to the internet and all that. when i got home, i was so annoyed with verizon that i decided to go out for dinner with karen. we went to "not your average joe's" (of course), which interestingly enough did not have the two things karen had ordered... perhaps today was just one of those days... in which someday i'll look back on this and laugh. we'll see.