Hello, Hopefully someone can assist me. Up until recently I had a perfectly good functioning LAN & internet connection between my 2 PCs (W2K). Now I only have the LAN connection, but can no longer access the internet via LAN from the Client PC ("page cannot be displayed") !! Present Setup: Client & Host - W2K + IE6.0 with latest updates NICs:3COM 3C905B-TX. Connection to internet is via USB to EUMEX (German) ISDN splitter. Internet access software is supplied by ISP (SmartSurfer). On both LANs I'm using "Client for MS Network, File & Print Sharing, NetBui and TCP/IP". "Enable Internet Connection Sharing" & "Enable on-demand Dialing" on the internet connection are activated. Eumex (ISDN) settings are all "automatic". I had static addresses on both machines with the same SubNet Mask (255.255.255.0) and on the Client I used the Default Gateway address of the Host. IE connection for the Client is set to "LAN" and I'm using "Automatically detect settings" - nothing else is checked. IE connection for the Host is set to ?? What works: The Client & Host can ping their own IP addresses (192.168.0.14/192.168.0.150) and their own Names ("second"/"computer") and those of the other machine. Pinging 127.0.0.1 and 0.0.0.0 and w3.org all work except the Client cannot ping w3.org. What I have done to date to attempt to fix this: I have played with all combinations of addresses including automatic assigned addresses. Deinstalled NetBui, but this doesn't seem to have any affect - so reinstalled. I have uninstalled the adapters and reinstalled the latest drivers (3COM Ethernet 10/100 PCI TX NIC (3C905B-TX). Re-installed IE 6.0 (+ latest updates). Deinstalled and reinstalled Norton Antivirus & Firewall (also ensured that the other PC is included in the exemption list). Ran Micorosoft AntiSpyware + XoftSpy + HiJackThis (posted to a forum and deleted suggested files) - found and deleted a few SpyWare bugs. Ran IspFix to see if the problem was in the Winsock. Changed NIC cards to see if the problem lies there - no luck. Lastly, Completely formatted both PCs and reinstalled W2K + Ie6 SP1. Possible Issues: I thought the problem could be the Firewalls, but after completly formatting and reinstalling w2k + IE6, I attempted to access the net from the Client WITHOUT and firewalls without any success. I'm not sure this is normal, but when only the Host is turned on the IP address is different to when both machines are on, i.e IP address is 0.0.0.0 Occassionally Windows Explorer crashes when a file on the other machine is opened (e.g. When I work on the Client PC and open and work on a file from the Host PC). Event Viewer (CLient="second") tells me: on starting the PC: "Your computer has automatically configured the IP address for the Network Card with network address 00500437BFD7. The IP address being used is 169.254.236.46." When I attempt to access the internet: "The master browser has received a server announcement from the computer COMPUTER that believes that it is the master browser for the domain on transport NetBT_Tcpip_{C08BC8C4-6CA0-461E-. The master browser is stopping or an election is being forced. " or "The browser has forced an election on network \Device\NetBT_Tcpip_{C08BC8C4-6CA0-461E-8C93-20411441A18E} because a master browser was stopped." or "The browser service has failed to retrieve the backup list too many times on transport \Device\NetBT_Tcpip_{C08BC8C4-6CA0-461E-8C93-20411441A18E}. The backup browser is stopping." Event Viewer (CLient="second") tells me: Windows 2000 IP Configuration - CLIENT Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : second Primary DNS Suffix . . . . . . . : Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Mixed IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection : Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : Description . . . . . . . . . . . : 3Com Etherlink 10/100 PCI TX NIC 10/100 (3C905B-TX) Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-50-04-37-bf-D7 DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.14 Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0 Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.150 DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : Windows 2000 IP Configuration - HOST Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : computer Primary DNS Suffix . . . . . . . : Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcast IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : Yes WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection 3: Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : Description . . . . . . . . . . . : 3Com Etherlink 10/100 PCI TX NIC 10/100 (3C905B-TX) Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-50-04-09-d1-f4 DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.150 Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0 Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection 2: Media State. . . . . . . . . . . : CAble Disconnected Description.......................: Eumex 504PC SE Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-30-42-ff-fd-01 PPP adapter SmartSurfer2000: Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : Description . . . . . . . . . . . : WAN <PPP/SLIP> Interface Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-53-45-09-d1-f4 DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 217.185.7.53 Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.255 Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 217.185.7.53 DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 62.53.220.227 193.189.244.205 NetBios over Tcpip................: Disabled Nik

This is why Internet Connection Sharing sucks. Nutshell of how ICS works. You have the internet connected NIC, and the LAN connected NIC. When you enable ICS, that machine becomes a router, and utilizes Network Address Translation, similar to SOHO routers people buy, which actually work. :-) Next, the LAN connected NIC is set to a private ip address of 192.168.0.1. Your computer also becomes a DHCP server on that NIC. Your computer then begins handing out TCP/IP configuration information to all the computers in your network, giving IP addresses of 192.168.0.2-254, subnet mask of 255.255.255.0, default gateway of 192.168.0.1 (LAN NIC on the ICS hosting computer). "I had static addresses on both machines with the same SubNet Mask (255.255.255.0) and on the Client I used the Default Gateway address of the Host." You don't statically assign either one of these. Once you enable ICS, Windows takes over the configuration information for the ICS hosted computer's LAN NIC. DHCP on that NIC will then config the other computer. My guess for why it broke is your ISP changed it's configuration in DNS or default gateway. Because you statically assigned TCP/IP settings within each LAN NIC, neither got updated correctly. "Event Viewer (CLient="second") tells me: on starting the PC: "Your computer has automatically configured the IP address for the Network Card with network address 00500437BFD7. The IP address being used is 169.254.236.46." Sounds like the DHCP service on the ICS hosting computer is not working properly. 169.254.x.x is APIPA, which is enabled when a DHCP configed computer can't contact a DHCP server for a config. Remove ICS on that computer. Get it working on the internet. Once you do, set it's LAN connected NIC to automatic IP config, then share the net connection. At that point, leave the config of the LAN connected NIC alone! Other computer, set it to automatic IP address config. Everything should work at that point. A better solution is remove ICS, and go get a router with USB to accept the Net connection, and plug both computers via ethernet into the router. Better security, more reliable, faster, more convenient. "President Bush is doing everything he can to lower gas prices, including...making the oil companies so rich that maybe they'll get sick of money."

Hello, Almost spot on the money. I finally resolved the problem - bloody TCP/IP stacks. I had to take out the NICs, restart the PCs, re-install them and on restart the stacks sorted themselves out. I don't know why this occurred - if you do, I 'd like to hear it. You said above, that a seperate router give "better security, is more reliable and faster" could you please explain why? Nik

Certainly. A router is basically a dedicated computer designed for the sole purpose of routing. Your windows machine isn't. You use it for all other things as well, but NAT and the like taxes the system, thereby slowing it down. A router is also more secure because with ICS, you still have a windows machine running a windows network protocol stack, which has been proven to not have the best security. It's also not as reliable as you saw in your problem here. With a router, you have a totally different stack usually proprietary to the vendor, or it may be linux. Either way, it's harder to hack, and a hacker must bypass this somehow before they get to your windows machines, not to mention its processor will initially absorb and deny unsolicited connection attempts, not the firewall and therefore your computer's processor with ICS. With ICS in your current setup, the reality is you still have a windows machine with an internet connected NIC. Windows just released a TCP/IP stack vulnerability fix just a month or two ago!