On board NIC not working

  • Thread starter Thread starter 'Chelle
  • Start date Start date
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'Chelle

I have Windows 2000 Professional....

I recently purchased a new barebones machine which
includes a motherboard, processor and power supply. I
installed a new hard drive and installed 2000
professional. I did not have the drivers for the on board
nic so I temporarily installed a PCI nic card to get it on
the internet and download the appropriate drivers for the
on board nic. After I downloaded the drivers I turned off
the machine, physically removed the PCI nic card, and
turned the machine on and installed the drivers for the on
board nic. Even though the on board NIC is recognized and
shows connected, it does not work to get an IP address.
It shows up in My Network Places as Local Area Connection
2. I am thinking it has something to do with the fact
that I installed that PCI nic card first to connect to the
internet.

What do I need to do to get the machine to show the on
board nic as the primary Local Area Connection?
 
Open Device Manager, click View and select Show hidden devices. You should
now be able to see an entry for the removed PCI adapter. Right click it and
select uninstall. Reboot.

Doug Sherman
MCSE Win2k/NT4.0, MCSA, MCP+I, MVP
 
How are you connecting to the internet, cable modem? IF it's not
getting an IP address, it could be that you need to reboot the cable
modem. Otherwise, any chance you need to change the settings in the
NIC to auto-detect the network speed (if you are not using a hub or
switch this won't matter)? OR - if you are NOT using DHCP, you might
need to give it correct DNS servers?

You mention "What do I need to do to get the machine to show the
onboard nic as the primary Local Area Connection?"...you shouldn't
need to do anything. The machine should use whatever default gateway
is currently active, it doesn't care if you have 3 NICs, as long as
one has a default gateway.
 
I am using a cable modem via a router which is set to act
as a DHCP server. All of my PC's are set for DHCP.

I went into Device manager and unhid the devices and it
shows the PCI nic and the on board nic are preset. So I
uninstalled them both and rebooted the machine. While the
machine is off I took out the PCI nic card. The PC
detected and installed the driver for the on board NIC.
Again, the NIC is detected, it is listed in the network
properties as the Local Area Connection #2 but does not
get an IP address via that nic.

Does it make a difference if the PCI NIC that I just
uninstalled is not in the original PCI slot when I FIRST
installed it?
 
Your connection is called Local Area Connection #2 because that is the name
Windows gave it when it was created. You can change this name to anything
you want. If you still have an icon for Local Area Connection #1, you
should be able to delete it by right clicking it and selecting delete. If
you can't, then you have not completely uninstalled the PCI adapter in any
case, but you should be able to disable this connection.

The reason your adapter is not getting an IP is probably because your ISP
has already assigned an IP to this connection on the PCI adapter and it was
never released. Open a command prompt and type ipconfig/all. If your
onboard adapter has an IP of 0.0.0.0 or 169.254.x.x, try ipconfig/renew. If
that doesn't work, unplug the power supply to your cable modem and leave it
unplugged for several minutes. Reconnect and reboot.

Doug Sherman
MCSE Win2k/NT4.0, MCSA, MCP+I, MVP
 
I tried all those options and the on board NIC still will
not obtain an IP address. I never initially uninstalled
the PCI NIC card when I first took it out. After I
installed the drivers for the on board nic and realized it
didn't work, I stuck the PCI card back into the machine in
a different PCI slot. It named itself Local Area
Connection #4. Do I need to install the PCI card back
into the ORIGINAL PCI slot and try to uninstall it again?

If the drivers for the on board nic were incorrect, then
it would not be recognized at all right? I am just trying
to see if there may be a "ghost" nic still installed or if
I may have the wrong drivers installed. But I would think
if it was the wrong driver, the device manager would show
the Network Adapter with a yellow exclamation mark.
 
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