Easy switchting between wired and wifi network

Hi all,

something I have not been able to figure out in Win7:

When I take my laptop to the living room it has access to my network via WiFi which works fine but a little slow. When I take it into my home-office I can connect the LAN cable and this makes things much quicker.

However, it seems to always conect via Wireless unless I disable that connection. Is there a way to make it go to the wired connection unless that is not available and only then switch to Wireless?

Thanks!
Dries

DriesBessels said:

Hi all,

something I have not been able to figure out in Win7:

When I take my laptop to the living room it has access to my network via WiFi which works fine but a little slow. When I take it into my home-office I can connect the LAN cable and this makes things much quicker.

However, it seems to always conect via Wireless unless I disable that connection. Is there a way to make it go to the wired connection unless that is not available and only then switch to Wireless?

Thanks!
Dries

Is a matter of fact Windows 7 will choose to use the wired connection if both connections are working or plugged in. So in order to use the wireless simply unplug the eithernet cable and it should connect automatically to the wireless connection. You can also just turn off the wireless connection by using the wireless off switch on the laptop.

If you want to use the wired connection just plug it in and it will take over the wireless connection automatically without having to do a thing. I have tested this out on my laptop and it works for me everytime.

Somehow, when I connect the ethernet cable the adapter get's an IP address but that is all. It does not use that connection until I disconnect from the wireless network. I have figured out how to set a preferred wireless network but not how to make my wired connection preferred...
If anybody knows?
thanks!
Dries

DriesBessels said:

Somehow, when I connect the ethernet cable the adapter get's an IP address but that is all. It does not use that connection until I disconnect from the wireless network. I have figured out how to set a preferred wireless network but not how to make my wired connection preferred...
If anybody knows?
thanks!
Dries

In that case something is wrong with your wired connection or the router is having problems with DHCP.

I have tested this out six ways to Sunday and the wired connection always takes over and works perfectly for me the second I plug it in. It shows up in the network and sharing center as two networks when they are both plugged in. It should look like the picture below.

You will need to post the ipconfig /all from your machine when it's plugged in. If there is a problem it will show up there. The ipconfig looks like the picture below, I need that from your machine when it's plugged in with the wireless still connected.

To be honest, I doubt if that is it. I have one HP netbook and one Acer Laptop and they both do the same thing. DHCP is working fine and so is everything else.
Output from IPCONFIG is too much for one screen so I piped it to a text file, sorry for the bad formatting:

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : hppc-PC
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : fritz.box

Ethernet adapter Bluetooth-netwerkverbinding:

Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected
Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Bluetooth-apparaat (Personal Area Network)
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-24-7E-1A-9D-57
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes

Wireless LAN adapter Draadloze netwerkverbinding:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : fritz.box
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcom 802.11g Network Adapter
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-21-00-9C-15-F0
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . . : fe80::39ec:9721:504c:51d0%12(Preferred)
IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.178.25(Preferred)
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : vrijdag 5 november 2010 17:01:58
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : maandag 15 november 2010 17:01:58
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.178.1
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.178.1
DHCPv6 IAID . . . . . . . . . . . : 218112256
DHCPv6 Client DUID. . . . . . . . : 00-01-00-01-14-47-7E-21-00-22-64-83-F0-51
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.178.1
NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Enabled

Ethernet adapter LAN-verbinding:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : fritz.box
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcom NetLink (TM) Gigabit Ethernet
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-22-64-83-F0-51
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . . : fe80::193e:fafa:1f15:6257%11(Preferred)
IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.178.22(Preferred)
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : vrijdag 5 november 2010 17:01:55
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : maandag 15 november 2010 17:01:54
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.178.1
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.178.1
DHCPv6 IAID . . . . . . . . . . . : 234889828
DHCPv6 Client DUID. . . . . . . . : 00-01-00-01-14-47-7E-21-00-22-64-83-F0-51
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.178.1
NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Enabled