This is my work PC I'm talking about - currently I'm using someone elses PC to figure out how to fix *my* problem
Quick summery of the problem: I keep getting "A network cable has been unplugged." error at the bottom right of my screen. Watching the connection at the back I get a live connection for approx 55seconds and a dead connection for 15seconds. Of course by the time windows actually realizes I have my connection back again I get about 20-30 seconds of a live connection.
I posted this on another forum, but haven't recieved any answers, I hope someone can help me soon.
At first I thought I had a loose connection w/ the network card and the cable cord (getting the good old windows "Local area connection: a network cable has been unplugged" message in the bottom-right hand corner popping up). Well after confirming the connection there was fine (and I wasn't getting any work done anyway) I sat back there and stared at the network card light go on and then off. Just sitting there staring at it in frustration I started to notice a pattern, so I actually started to time when the lights came on (live network connection) to when the lights just went dead (dead connection).
I pulled out the stopwatch feature on my watch and sure enough, there's a set pattern!@#!@ I get a live connection for roughly 55 seconds, and a dead connection for 15-18~ish seconds (having to stop my watch and reset and start over again I'm sure I'm not as accurate as can be, but there *is* a pattern). After timing it a repeated 3 times I decided it wasn't going to change the pattern, then promptly ran a virus-check on the pc and also transfered over "Spybot Search & Destroy" from someone else's PC.
Well, removed some adware cookies anyway...
Neither managed to fix my problem.
Now I had contacted the place the computer was purchased and they said it sounded like a trojan, and that they wouldn't be able to look at it for weeks. Gee...
So ya, sounds like a trojan. Updated nortan AV couldn't find anything, and neither did spybot search and destroy. I assume it's adware gone wrong and that it's fairly new (since I *never* download and install anything onto my work PC, but I do have activex enabled :( )
I shut my PC off a little annoyed with it and came downstairs here to see if I could find any help online. Before I left my office I noticed the network card had it's "live" lights on - cool, even when the pc's off it lets you know if it's connected or not. So I sat and started my stopwatch... it stayed live for over 2 minutes! W/ the pc turned off.
Anyway, I'm pretty sure that confirms that it's not a problem with the network card and that it actually is some kind of adware/trojan whatever, the problem only persists when my computer's actually logged on to an account. Can anyone help me out? Has anyone heard of this problem and know what's specificly causing it so I ca find it and remove it from my system?
In fact I think I can pinpoint exactly when this problem started. I was visiting
http://www.zophar.net to see if there were any new Sega CD emulators recently (my sega CD's broken but I just recently found my old Dark Wizard disc, woot). Anyway, I hadn't visited the site in a long time, and I was suprised to get bombarded with popups etc. I forget exactly what happened, but I immediatly noticed something strange going on with my PC, strange enough to make me shut it off and restart it. Ever since then I've had that re-occuring "You are not connected to a network" (or whatever the exact message is) with the little X overtop of the two computers in the bottom right corner of my screen. And no, I didn't download anything - in fact I didn't even get to see if there actually were any new emulators out (no point downloading it at work anyway). I've been too afraid to go back. I hope that's enough information, any help would be *greatly* appreciated.
(my follow-up post)
More information:
K guys I'm really stumped.
The connection stays strong and live when I load in msconfig's "diagonostics" mode. It also seems to stay strong on the user select screen. But the second I put in my password and log-on I lose the connection (log on to any account).
So the culprit is something that's loading when I load up any of my user accounts. In fact I think I tracked it down to a specific instance svchost.exe (there are 4 instances of it, 1 by the local serrvice, one network service, and two system, it's one of the system that I suspect). I was watching in the task manager for CPU processes and for a 11-16kb instance of svchost (the size of the process fluctuates quite abit) and whenever I got a dead connection the CPU processes for that instance jumped to 16, and whenever my connection went live again it again jumped to around 2.
Also, the second I end that process I lose all access to my internet. Not only do I lose all access to my internet but I lose my window "Styles" etc - instead of the nice colours and windows scheme I chose I get a blocky ugly windows explorer window.
Based on this information is anyone able to help me with my problem? All I can think of to do is format my computer - but backing up all the needed files etc. would just take so long (ESPECIALLY since I keep losing the freakin network connection to "a network cable has been unplugged" when it hasn't, otherwise I'd just transfer the bulk of my files over the network temporarily ).
Or is there even a quick-fix so I *can* transfer those files over? Perhaps a way to start MSconfig in a way similar to diagnostics mode but with only the neccessary network drivers? (I've tried disabling almost everything I know I can go without, but the problem persists...)
ASFD
This is so frustrating. And I'm almost positive the culprit is adware.. those companies need to go to hell :( Or at least learn to program so problems like these don't occur
