Solving a network problem can be hard and frustrating. While you can check your internet connection using the Windows Network Diagnostic tool, it is hardly enough to solve most problems. Sometime, you might have to troubleshoot via the hard way – the command line way.
There are several advantages to using th command line instead of the visual interface:
- We can check on individual item, and isolate those that are causing the problems.
- Command line tend to have more options so we can test the system deeply.
- We can use scripts to automate the process.
In this article, we will show you how to diagnose and fix network problems using the command line.
To get started, first make sure that you are running the command prompt with Administrator privilege.
How to know if your cable is connected
You can use the
ipconfigtool to check if you are experiencing some problem with your cable. Windows will show up a list of the interfaces and if they are connected or not.
How to know if your gateway is working
A gateway is the device, usually a router, that connects your computer to other networks and Internet. If you cannot connect with your device, it is pretty sure you are not going to connect to the Internet. First you need to know the IP address of the device. You can use
Ipconfigto give us the information about the default gateway:
Now you can use
pingto test if the gateway respond. This tool informs if a device with a given IP is answering. In plain English, with this test, we know that our network adapter, the cable and the router are connected correctly.
How to know if your dns is working
A DNS server is capable of converting a site name, for example www.maketecheasier.com, to its IP address. To connect to a computer in Internet, Windows needs that number. If you cannot connect to your DNS , it is almost impossible that Internet works.
As you can see in this case I have the same router and DNS IP address.
To test the DNS you can use
nslookup. This command make a query to that server. In the following image you can see how the server resolve Make Tech Easier address.
How to know if a process is opening too much connections
Every time a program needs to connect to Internet or other machine, it opens a new connection. A router can only handle a limited number of connection. If for any reason, a program opens many connections, you can end up with a block Internet.
We can do this with the command
netstatand the parameters “a” and “b”netstat -a -b
You can see what programs are using these connections. In this case, you can see that I have a program named “Filezilla Server” listening in port 21.
How to check firewall rules
Firewall misconfiguration can lead to Internet malfunctioning. A firewall configuration is no more than a set of rules deciding whether an application can access the Internet or not. By default, these rules appear in abundance and you cannot see all of them in one screen. Instead, we can insert this information on a text file using the following commands:
netsh advfirewall firewall show rule name=all > firewallrules.txtnotepad firewallrules.txt
The first command access the firewall configuration and write it to a text file. The second command open the text file in a new notepad window.
A basic use of the
netshutility can inform us if there is one or more blocking rules to that use the command:netsh advfirewall firewall show rule name | find "Block"Unfortunately it doesn’t show what is the program blocked by that rule.
What other tricks do you use to test your internet connections?
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
How To Fix Network Problems Using Command Line Tools In Windows 7
Monday, February 7, 2011
Failing hard drive sounds - Datacent.com - Datacent
Hard drive sounds
These are some typical sounds we hear in our data recovery lab. If your hard drive makes noises like these and you are still able to access your files - backup immediately. If your drive can no longer be seen in your system please fill out our simple evaluation form to get a fast quote on our data recovery services.
To listen to the sound simply click on the play button. Click on the drive manufacturer next to the sound button to learn more about common problems these drives experience.
Western Digital
Western Digital desktop drive with bad heads clunking.
Western Digital 500GB desktop drive with bad heads slowly clicks a few times and spins down.
Western Digital 250GB desktop drive with head crash clicks a few times, then spins down.
Western Digital 250GB desktop drive with stuck spindle can't spin up, chatters.
Western Digital laptop drive with bad heads making clicking sound.
Western Digital 200GB desktop drive with bad preamplifier chip (located on the headstack) clicks a few times, spins down.
Western Digital desktop drive with unstable heads clicks a few times and stops spinning.
Western Digital laptop hard drive with stuck spindle trying to spin up with siren.
Western Digital 500GB desktop hard drive with bad bearings can't gain full rotational speed.
Seagate
Seagate desktop drive with failing heads making thrashing, then clicking sound.
Seagate desktop drive with bad heads slowly clicks and beeps on spin up.
Seagate laptop drive with bad heads making clicking/knocking sound.
Seagate desktop drive with seized spindle trying to spin up.
Seagate Momentus laptop drive with bad heads making nasty drilling noise.
Maxtor
Maxtor desktop drive with bad heads making clicking/knocking/beeping noise.
Maxtor drive with bad heads making steady clicking/knocking sound.
Maxtor desktop drive with stuck spindle playing futuristic cell phone melody.
Maxtor drive with stuck spindle and musical siren again.
Samsung
Samsung 80GB desktop hard drive with bad heads making fast clicking sound.
Samsung desktop hard drive with bad heads clicks, then spins down.
Samsung 40GB desktop hard drive with bad head knocks a few times.
Samsung desktop drive with degraded media making scratching sound when hitting bad sectors.
Hitachi/IBM
Hitachi laptop drive with bad heads clicks once on spin up, then beeps.
IBM desktop drive with degraded media making scratching sound when hitting area with bad sectors.
Hitachi/IBM laptop drive with bad heads making clicking sound.
IBM 40GB desktop hard drive with degraded media/heads rattles and squeals on spin up.
Hitachi 60GB laptop drive with stuck spindle can't spin up, makes humming/buzzing noise.
Toshiba
Toshiba laptop hard drive with stuck spindle trying to spin up(heard if taken close to your ear).
Toshiba laptop drive with failing bearings making grinding sound.
Toshiba laptop drive with bad bearings making loud grinding sound.
Toshiba laptop drive with bad bearings making nasty drilling/screaming sound.
Toshiba laptop drive with bad heads making clicking/sweeping sound on boot up.
Fujitsu
Fujitsu laptop drive with bad heads making clicking/knocking noise.
Fujitsu laptop hard drive with bad heads making sweeping sound.
Fujitsu 40gb desktop drive with bad media making scratching noise.
Quantum
Quantum desktop drive with bad heads making clunking sound.
... more to come....
here. -->
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