Cannot connect to the internet

[#1]

Quote from: jelv

The thing about ZoneAlarm is that it notifies you if an unexpected program tries to contact the internet - Windows firewall doesn't offer that protection.

Bit like a rev. counter on a car.  Gives you some extra information that might be useful but isn't necessary.

[#2]

Well, thanks to all the suggestions which, as always, were usefuland productive.  The Forum really is a big selling advantage for Plusnet, because it has sorted things out for me too many times to remember !
Having tried all the above ideas, certainly the laptop is perfoming again without hanging or losing connection.  It is far too early to be sure but last night and today there were no problems.
I suspect frankly that Zone Alarm was really the culprit.  I uninstalled it before but it did not seem to make any difference and so re-installed it again.  Having dealt also with .net framework, done some pinging, re-partitioned it and removed Zone Alarm again (and douyble checked that it had gone, gone, gone this time), things are very much better so far.  My error was doing all those things together and not sequentially but I nevertheless suspect Zone Alarm more than anything else.
So thanks again to all.

[#3]

In case anyone is curious about ZoneLabs, the affair was like this -
In normal use the PC shows a little 'online' icon on the status bar which stops showing as online if you don't use the connection for a while, but will re-appear when you use the internet again.
All the PCs I've had since Vista have done this. I'm no expert, I have no idea what happens or why.
But, using ZoneLabs security, it seemed that when the 'connected' icon changes to not-connected after a period of inactivity, ZL logs an assigned IP - 169.254.#.# - as being the correct IP to accept. Thus, when you come to use the internet again you get no connection.
This isn't a conclusive or comprehensive explanation, but this is certain what was happening sometimes. Someone else may have a better idea of what actually goes on with Windows in this respect.
I had a ticket with ZL customer support for over a month with this. They had no idea what was happening and eventually stopped answering my queries trying to resolve it.
It seems curious that ZoneLabs still haven't resolved it - assuming the problem is the same, of course. There were plenty of people who had this issue on their forums. ZL were sort of in denial about it.
But rather than blame ZL for it, I do think it was after a certain upgrade from Windows that it began because when I was trying to network an older PC, and had to install some up-to-date network software to the older machine, that, too, inherited the same problem while running ZoneLabs.
It remains a mystery.

[#4]

IanSN
That all sounds very plausible because in fact I dug out an old W98 laptop from the cupboard to do some comparison tests using WiFi (pcmcia card) and ethernet.  I have not used it for donkey's years and was surprised that it even worked !  It worked like a dream, absolutely no problems of any sort, and I was amazed how fast it was, even with only 200 mb Ram !
What you describe fits like a "T". I would download a few emails, work on them, send them and then wait for an answer for ten minutes.  Whenever I tried to download with Outlook after that, nothing would happen, and it could not find the mail.plus.net server.  Funnily enough, it seemed to find the relay.plus.net without any trouble.  And the internet would be virtually inaccessible - maybe the fist page I tried would come up, but absolutely no further links within a page.  Only by re-bootong could I ever get a connection again.
I should add that, fingers crossed and touch wood, things are all still working.

[#5]

glad to hear it  
maybe something about the way Windows configures network connections disagrees with the way ZL firewall works. Really odd though.
I learned how to configure the 2-way Windows firewall in the end. (Not easy!)
I agree with RR that ZL warns you about things you don't need warning about. But I'm not that confident about what goes in and out the backdoor I'm afraid! (Anymore than I'd leave the backdoor open on my house, however much I may love my neighbour!)
Yep, touch wood!

edit -- yes! I remember that, too. First page and then no futher....

[#6]

Quote from: IanSn

In normal use the PC shows a little 'online' icon on the status bar which stops showing as online if you don't use the connection for a while, but will re-appear when you use the internet again.

This may be normal for you but the connection symbol vanishing after a period of inactivity is not normal (I see a lot of computers so I should know).  Do you have your router set to drop the connection to the internet after a period of inactivity (an "idle timeout" setting)?  This is highly inadvisable from the point of view of getting the best broadband speeds and offers no benefit to anyone who does not pay by the minute for their internet connection. 

[#7]

Interesting.
No, not unless the 'idle timeout' is default. I wouldn't have tinkered with that otherwise. But it certainly still drops. I don't know how to monitor what actually happens. Where would the setting for the timeout be?
Its not a problem now as I don't use ZoneLabs anymore, but I'd be very interested to know why it does it.
I noticed yesterday that if I pull the ethernet cable out of the Mac, the network settings also revert to that assigned 169.254. IP. Then if I plug it back in the PN IP comes back. Sort of mimicking what happens on the PC.
But, differently to ZL, the firewall on the Mac does not then log the wrong IP and hang on to it.
--
edit -- BTW, use the same router for Mac and PC. Connection does not drop on the Mac.

[#8]

Quote from: IanSn

edit -- BTW, use the same router for Mac and PC. Connection does not drop on the Mac.

In the old days of dial-up modems you could set an idle time-out on your dial-up internet connection to save money.  I think if you strive to go wrong you might be able to set-up an internet connection that runs over your Ethernet cable but still operates in the manner of a dial-up connection (though I would not know how to do it).  What do you see listed under Network Connections on the PC, IanSn?

[#9]

Or it might be possible to set your Ethernet port into a power-saving mode that turns it off after a period of inactivity.  But I have never seen it done and would not know how.

[#10]

Quote from: ReedRichards

Or it might be possible to set your Ethernet port into a power-saving mode that turns it off after a period of inactivity.  But I have never seen it done and would not know how.

...Not sure where you're going with this one now!...  Why might I want to do that?
I'm not near the PC at the moment, I'll have a look later. I would like to get to the bottom of why the PC connection icon disapppears. But it isn't a problem now, just a curiosity.