"Unidentified Network - No Network Access" at random!

Hi everyone! Oh look, it's this thread again.

Well, sort of. A majority of what I can find are "Unidentified Network - No Internet Access". This is just straight-up "no network access", which seems to be a less common issue. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium x64, and I'm connected to a BT Home Hub 2.0a via ethernet, using a BT Home Hotspot to make a connection using the power circuitry in the house.

My connection will drop completely out of the blue. It's fine and dandy right now, but at completely random times it will just drop. I can't clearly predict it. In Network & Sharing Center, it attempts to identify the network, only to give up and throw out "Unidentified Network - No Network Access". I'll detail symptoms and things I've done to try and fix it.

- 6-7 times out of 10, the connection can be restored by disabling/re-enabling the network adapter, or switching the Home Hotspot off and then on again; so essentially, disabling/re-enabling the connection. It will fail again some hours later.

- I've ruled out any issue with the Hotspot connection method, ethernet ports, and drivers as I've tried to connect directly to my Hub wirelessly with two separate USB dongles - wireless has the exact same issue, and in this scenario, the connection can be temporarily restored by moving the wireless dongle to another USB slot. Taking it out and putting it back into the same slot won't work, it has to be a different USB slot. And when that eventually fails, I reconnect the dongle into the previous slot, and it works. This is one of the strangest and most senseless aspects about the whole thing.

- The issue has persisted across fresh reinstalls for a number of years, and even fresh computer parts. I gradually built this PC by upgrading my previous one to the point where the only original remaining parts are the old hard drive, which my Windows install resides on, and the CD drive. Said hard drive has been extensively wiped and reformatted with several fresh Windows installs over its life.

- Issue with the Home Hub? Doesn't seem so, my dad's laptop connects wirelessly 100% of the time, as do my iPod and phone. Their connections are 100% speed 100% of the time with no drops. I talked to BT just this afternoon, they ran a line test and determined there was zero fault with my Hub's connection to the internet. I even went as far as buying a new TP-Link modem/router recently, and the issue persisted; albeit manifesting a little differently, with the disconnects replaced by very frequently dropping to speeds in the bytes, and still disconnecting from time to time.

- Issue with Hamachi interfering? Doesn't look like it, on my last clean install I didn't install Hamachi for a while, and the issue persisted. When I'm not using Hamachi, I power it off, and Local Area Connection is prioritized over Hamachi. I disable the Hamachi network adapter completely, issue persists.

I've tried a bunch of things to fix it, both Googling the problem (which led me to this forum) and adjusting settings under the advice of a friend who is a former IT professional. I have checked "always use this IP address" in Home Hub settings, set a static IP in the adapter's IPv4 settings*, disabled IPv6, updated my network adapter drivers (Realtek PCIe GBE Family Controller), ipconfig release and then renew in an elevated command prompt, netsh winsock reset, DNS flush, resetting TCP/IP stack, setting "100mbps Full Duplex" instead of "Auto-Negotiate", and uninstalling multiple instances of "Microsoft ISATAP Adapter" and "Teredo Tunneling Pseudo-Interface", which only end up reinstalling themselves anyway. All of these were either advice from my friend, who is now stumped, or solutions offered by forum threads on Google. None of them made a difference. I see that some kind of program named "Bonjour" can cause this issue, but it's not and never has been installed on my PC.

*I kept these static IP settings, and also tried Google's DNS servers, which I also ended up keeping as you can see from my ipconfig. Doesn't make a difference to the issue anyway. Even "stock", with DHCP assigning the addresses automatically, the issue remains the same.

Here's a pic of my ipconfig. Anything else I can get to shed light on my configuration, let me know.



I feel like I've tried absolutely everything under the sun, and I'm tired of my connection dropping at absolute random when I'm in important conference calls or simply trying to relax by gaming online. I seriously hope there's someone out there who knows something I don't. Any and all help is appreciated. Thank you

Hello,
The only thing that ever caused me as much trouble was having Apple's Bonjour service running. It totally messed up my network. I remember reading that it had to do with it setting up a 0.0.0.0.0 address. Uninstalling it fixed my issues. Maybe you have it installed?
Regards

Hi John, thank you for the response. Nope, double and triple checked, Bonjour is not on my PC.

I found something interesting last night involving WOL. Since it's a random speed drop/disconnection issue it's a waiting game to see if anything I try works, but I'm trying this guy's method right now and have just powered the PC back up.

Ethernet keeps disconnecting - TechSpot Forums

So strange, but at this point I'm willing to try anything!

Hello Ethan,
...Interesting thing on the Wake on Lan issue. I had originally installed the whole Intel package for my Lan, but found the options way too complicated for my taste, specially since I'd been having lots of Event Viewer issues with my new build (I think Mercury must have been in retrograde... )
Anyhow, I ended up installing just the bare-bone LAN driver and this reduced my Viewer issues down to one from over a dozen.
Simple is better? Good luck with the troubleshooting!
Regards-

As usual, a letdown. I did all that guy said about the WOL, including disconnecting the power cable and pumping the button... the issue persists, although it does seem a mite more stable.

I feel like I've tried everything under the sun right now.