Busted Windows 8, 10 update blamed for breaking Brits' DHCP Folks using Windows 10 and 8 on BT and Plusnet networks in the UK are being kicked offline by a mysterious software bug. Computers running the Microsoft operating systems are losing network connectivity due to what appears to be a problem with DHCP. Specifically, it seems some Windows 10 and 8 boxes can no longer reliably …
Sorry, but you failed. Double NATting a system is NOT the same as that system directly connected to the provider network and requesting DHCP addrs from it. Your address is coming from the Asus router. Still, good on you for not subscribing to Talk Talk, like so many other shitheads in the UK.
Do try putting your host on the BT side of your service and let us know how that goes?
I do the same thing on my production home network; comtrend box from the provider, and either a 1st gen Airport Extreme, or my "new" test/hacking network's WRT54GL. Nothing goes in betwixt, except when checking for localized ARP cache poisoning and checking the outbound connection and provider router settings.
Production home network - really? Double Natting - seriously? This makes no sense to what this issue is about.
The home gateway on the router to the provider network - as we all know - comes from the home gateway from the radius profile and PPP negotiates it without DHCP. Unless BT run their home gateways and routers on Windows 10 that's not the point. DHCP runs on the internal interface for the clients, for better or for worse.
Running a 3rd party router does solve one bit of the problem - whether it's in the production tier 3 home network or the DMZ in your shed. Seems a little harsh to dismiss quite a fair precaution in my mind with a lot of technical knownot putdown on the back of it.
"that tends to suggest that the problem is with the BT kit, not the client."
And given my experience with the quality of the BT kit, last one I had I changed the network from 192.168.1.x to 192.168.0.x to go with my antique setup, only to find the routing dialogs were hard coded to only accept 192.168.1.x addresses. I would certainly be focussing on "the BT kit".
It got replaced with an OpenReach Fibre modem and a proper router.
Is everyone sure that this is actually a problem limited to BT routers?
My wife's W10 PC has been suffering from network disconnects all this week. It's losing it's IP address and we aren't using a BT router. The DHCP addresses are coming from a Linux server and I can read the logs on there and my box is offering the DHCP info and it just isn't being taken up. It's only affected 1 PC, none of our other ones seem to be affected.
"Is everyone sure that this is actually a problem limited to BT routers?"
I'd suggest there's about a zero % chance that it's limited to BT routers. What will have happened is that MS, in their infinite wisdom, have decided that some DHCP option or other is 20 years old and now obsolete... without bothering to check if any brand of kit is still using it. Which implies that any router using said DHCP option will not work. It's a bit like if you've ever tried to change out a Sky router - you need to activate DHCP option 61 on the outside interface to connect to their network, which most modern routers don't bother with, so you're stuck using the (unimaginably shitty) Sky kit.
The proximate cause of this one is MS's error - they should've checked before rolling out. But the underlying cause is telcos insisting on shipping really decrepit equipment to their customers and not replacing it in a reasonably prompt manner.
"If DHCP fails when the client is pulling an address from a BT router, but works when it pulls an address from a non-BT box ... that tends to suggest that the problem is with the BT kit, not the client."
No. It tells you that either the client or the server (or both!) is not fully standards complient such that in combination, they don't work.
As it happens, I got home yesterday to my wife telling me her Win10 laptop can't connect to the network. I checked. It sees the WiFi but has a 169.*.*.* address. I tell Win10 to do run it's diags/fix thingy. It still fails. I run CMD and do an IPCONFIG /renew. Fails. Try IPCONFIG /release, IPCONFIG shows ip address details gon, use IPCONFIG to get new address and now it works. We're on VM and the Win10 laptop connects and gets DHCP from a re-purposed SamKnows monitoring router running DD-WRT. This has not been an issue once since she installed Win10. An odd coincidence? A windows 10 issue? Or does DD-WRT have the same "problem" as the BT/Plusnet routers?
>No. It tells you that either the client or the server (or both!) is not
>fully standards complient such that in combination, they don't work.
You have the idea that fully standards complient combinations always majgically work? ROFL
I take it that you don't actually have much to do with writing or using standards?
It could be a combination of both. Once I had a issue with a Netgear wifi device which wasn't able to get an IP from an old 3Com router which worked without issues with any other device.
Luckily my access point allowed for capturing a dump of the network traffic. It turned out the router was sending DHCP answers which contained more options (some unusual, but fully RFC compliant, like 12, "hostname") than the (open source) library used by Netgear could handle, being badly coded and implying a DHCP offer packet could not be larger than n bytes.
I fixed it using a Raspberry PI as a DHCP server turning off the router DHCP server.
I would not be surprised if someone at Microsoft "optimized" the DHCP code without actually knowing enough of the DHCP protocol. Many young developers believe reading the original specification and implementing full support is a waste of time.
Seriously though - DHCP - how hard can it be ??
Too difficult for Logitech apparently.
I had to give my Harmony Hub a static IP address as well. This was last month so they've apparently not fixed it yet.
"I had to give my Harmony Hub a static IP address as well. This was last month so they've apparently not fixed it yet."
Oh, is that what happened? After I tried restarting a couple times I reconfigured it into the bin. Was more fiddly than doing things by hand. Lucky I got it at a discount.
That was months ago, though. You say this was last month? Hmmm. Maybe my kit just died.
The original forum post was from 2015. I installed mine last month - so over a year and Logitech have still not fixed it. Mine worked but would periodically go into a fugue state for ten minutes. Giving it a static IP address fixed that. I still wish they had redesigned the remote but it's working well now.
This "update now bitch, you're helpless" mentality is a serious fucking problem and Microsoft is going to have to address this issue. The internet is swelling with pages describing update problems with Windows 10, and quite rightfully. It's no longer a debate if Windows 10 has approached updates in a broken manner, it's a sad fact.
These Windows update problems are making Mac and Linux look like advanced operating systems, when in reality Mac and Linux are just doing what their users expect, nothing advanced about that.
Arrive on-site, spend 15-20 mins checking the obvious then tell Joe Bloggs "It's because you've got Windows 10 and use BT broadband". They'll proceed to tell you, in excruciating detail, how their phone/tablet/laptop/neighbour are all fine & then look at you suspiciously whilst impugning your technical ability & parentage! I'm framing this... ;-)
{sigh} When something like that may require an intervention, I've already given a heads up to all the potential suffering individuals. Saves wear and tear on both sides. As for the netsh fix, been having to use it since about Windows XP in one form or another. Microsoft has regular teething problems with networking so much that ipconfig/all requires no thought at all.
"...then look at you suspiciously whilst impugning your technical ability & parentage!"
Ah, you've evidently met either my girlfriend or some spiritual twin of hers. Every time her work laptop fails to connect to a keyboard, mouse or the same router everything else in the house is perfectly happy with, or her VPN just randomly drops, I get exactly that look.
Ah, you've evidently met either my girlfriend or some spiritual twin of hers. Every time her work laptop fails to connect to a keyboard, mouse or the same router everything else in the house is perfectly happy with, or her VPN just randomly drops, I get exactly that look.
Is her name 'Cortana'??
My family and friends when I'm telling them to do something over the phone to fix their kit are often the same. One memorable comment from a sibling was "But it won't work if I do that!" My response was along the lines of "Oh yes it will and remind me which one of us has the word "engineer" in their job title?"
I've just dealt with three computers in the last couple of days. The first of which was a TalkTalk router; when I first looked I thought it might have been related to the mirai worm going around, but then I had a couple of others that were on BT hubs.
Edit: on two occasions I tried setting a fixed IP address in the Windows IPv4 configuration, re-enabling DCHP after then appeared to work.
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Agreed, it's not just BT. I manage a dozen networks, all using Zen. We have Cisco 877 or Cisco 887 on them all, and we've had this problem for a few weeks now. The first time it happened, I even had a desktop PC couriered to me as I couldn't use teamviewer to access it.
We had three on Monday, two Tuesday and two yesterday, at four different sites.
Running those commands does fix it, but you can only run them if you are a local admin, which our users aren't....
We actually reckon it's solely a windows problem, unrelated to any router, because all our sites use SBS 2011 or 2012 R2 as the DHCP provider. Our bets are on a recent windows update.
It's a PITA.
In all our cases, they are all win 10, upgraded from Win 7.
Dear customer,
Good news! Thanks to your unpaid alpha testing, this DHCP patch will be fixed before it is released to Enterprise and CBB customers.
Unfortunately, your PC will not be able to receive the corrected patch because it can no longer get an IP address. We are aware that this will inconvenience a small number of our users. However, awareness does not equal caring, so you're on your own figuring out a workaround. We suggest using your phone to search our user forums, where other disgruntled customers have shared random solutions that probably will not work.
Thank you again for alpha and beta testing our software. We hope you're enjoying your "free" copy of Windows 10.
Your pal, SatNad
Is it just that BT and Plusnet are the major ISP providers, or is it router specific?
If I understand this, it has nothing to do with the WAN side of the router, but is an issue between the DHCP server on the LAN side and W8.1 and W10 PCs using DHCP.
So unless everyone is failing it may be a bug/feature of those specific routers.
Haven't noticed anything on the two W8.1 laptops here.
Using a Buffalo router though.
The Windows clients are not working with their local DHCP provider, which is on the LAN interface(s) of their domestic router.
DHCP isn't hard, but there is quite a bit that can be set there that usually isn't.
Are these routers putting out a field:value that something in the Windows patch is choking on? It wouldn't be the first time that Microsoft have tried to rewrite the rules of basic networking or web protocols to suit their own means, is it?
Two Important questions to ask:-
Have you upgraded your {insert router device/ISP etc} device recently?
Has Microsoft forced an update to W10 on you in recent weeks?
Then ask yourself what has changed and who is the more likely culprit given that other (No MS) operating systems seem to be immune from this....
IMHO it is a case of "Hey Redmond, Fix it NOW"
I deal exclusively with home users. It's been a tough week explaining where the restart button is. So far this week:
20 on BT. 5 on TalkTalk. 2 on Sky.
(EE have also put a notice on their help pages).
19 had McAfee installed. 2 had Avast installed.
Most of my customers were blaming their ISPs, some have had other technically-minded users waste hours tinkering with settings - until I explained it was more likely to be Windows 10... something is crashing and due to the 'fast boot' feature, a shut down won't clear it, whereas a restart will. It's been a long week.
Have you tried restarting your computer?
Yes
I mean, restarting. Not Shut down, restart.
Um...?
Look, here, next to shutdown, is restart.
Oh!
Yeah, fast boot has been the cause of a number of callouts for me, when something goes wrong/crashes (maybe a driver?) that doesn't get properly restarted during a "shutdown".
I end up thorougly confusing my users trying to explain that since Windows 8, "shutdown" doesn't actually shut down as much of the computer as "restart" does
"Fast startup" killed me too, [2 machines on Virgin] and is *probably* root cause of DHCP issue. [Broke my BIOS, couldn't enter it, startup slowed to crawl]
BTW, for other readers, find the option hidden away here, Control Panel\Hardware and Sound\Power Options\System Settings "Turn on fast startup (recommended)"
So Microsoft : Shutdown means Shutdown
oh, I forgot, they obviously won't understand that, how about (IMHO) ...
* Don't disable normal users primary fix method of "turning it off and on again" with a broken, hidden, partial hibernation feature in order to save a few seconds on boot time (perhaps).
* Make it opt in, for those that want it, and obvious what is happening at shutdown and startup time.
* Measure the performance gains/losses for a newly selected "Fast Startuper" and act appropriately.
BTW, for other readers, find the option hidden away here, Control Panel\Hardware and Sound\Power Options\System Settings "Turn on fast startup (recommended)"
Not in my version of Windows 10. Control Panel/Power Options then Choose what the power button does/Change settings that are currentlu unavailable.
"I end up thorougly confusing my users trying to explain that since Windows 8, "shutdown" doesn't actually shut down as much of the computer as "restart" does"
Are you saying shutdown is now just hibernating and not shutting down? I ask because I shutdown my PC before I turn the mains power off. I'd like to think my PC is being shut down properly before I power it off, and not left in a hibernation mode.
"I'd like to think my PC is being shut down properly before I power it off" --- soulrideruk
Hibernate is power-off safe: the state of the O/S is written to disk (whereas "suspend" states require the maintenance of some power to RAM). The problem here is that starting a hibernated system reads the same broken state back from the disk rather than the O/S setting itself up "from scratch"
"The problem here is that starting a hibernated system reads the same broken state back from the disk rather than the O/S setting itself up "from scratch"
That explains why my wife claiming she'd shutdown her computer and it'd not fixed it then. Thanks, I'd not realised that's what the MS "fastboot" thing does. Next time I'll tell to select restart. Somehow I doubt she'll be able to get her head around ipconfig commands. Maybe I need a script to do that and "Fix Me" icon on the desktop for her.
Are you saying shutdown is now just hibernating and not shutting down? I ask because I shutdown my PC before I turn the mains power off. I'd like to think my PC is being shut down properly before I power it off, and not left in a hibernation mode.
At least you prevent the real reason that shutdown isn't: by killing off its power it won't be able to ship your data to Redmond when you're asleep. With Microsoft, it pays to be paranoid. That said, they've royally shot themselves in both feet by buggering up DHCP.
Even if they take a network stack from people who *know* what they're doing Microsoft manages to get it wrong, which is quite a special talent on its own. Not very helpful, though.
"Are you saying shutdown is now just hibernating and not shutting down? I ask because I shutdown my PC before I turn the mains power off. I'd like to think my PC is being shut down properly before I power it off, and not left in a hibernation mode."
It's just a product of the phrasing I use to explain to my very-non-technical users - Both Hibernate and Shutdown (when fast startup is enabled) turn off the power - but fast-startup-shutdown actually hibernates some core Windows processes. Call it a semi-hibernate.
Personally, nowadays I never actually "shut down" my computer. My laptop is always on sleep on the docking station and when on the move, and my PC I hibernate. Starts up much faster and on my laptop saves reopening all my tabs/email/documents/pdfs/explorer windows... Windows update reboot-required frustrates me!
Personally, nowadays I never actually "shut down" my computer. My laptop is always on sleep on the docking station and when on the move, and my PC I hibernate.
Why? I'd assume you've got an SSD as your boot drive on both, so the speed gains of "fast boot" are minimal? Of course, if you're a recidivist still reliant upon spinning rust, then there's no hope anyway.
My daughter came back from uni today, for Christmas, with her new w10 laptop (not been on my home network before) and it wouldn't connect to the Internet.
Said it was connected to the router, but not to the Internet. However I couldn't connect to the router admin via the browser.
A little digging revealed a problem with the ip allocation - it didn't get one from the router (or it did but didn't use it).
I checked the router dhcp reservations and the laptop wasn't listed there either.
Restarted the laptop (because off/on does sometimes work), no change.
Restarted the router (because off/on...), no change.
ipconfig showed a non lan compatible ip4 address and no subnet mask.
Reset the WiFi adapter (because why not, and off/on...) and /renew =
laptop connected to the Internet,
daughter happy,
phew, my reputation as tech guru safe. Only 30 minutes wasted.
Tomorrow it's w10 maintenance day for her laptop. I'd like to nuke it and install Linux but even the chance to play tux racer again (a childhood favourite) isn't tempting her away from the empire. Might dual boot it anyway.
even the chance to play tux racer again (a childhood favourite) isn't tempting her away from the empire
Maybe she's worked out that STK is now also available in a Windows version.
M.
Has no one taken a network capture on a failing PC using something like Wireshark?
In my experience XP and W7 can have a similar problem occasionally. Unfortunately W7 apparently no longer has the click option simply to update the lease.
One problem seen in the past was when a user's laptop moved between locations. The PC did its DHCP request before its network layer was full operational. As it did not see any answer to its DHCP request - then it used the previous gateway address. That was not valid so the PC assigned itself a Microsoft default IP address - and then needed a manual prod to try DHCP again.
Don't be silly - packet captures are the work of the devil.
I've worked with telephony companies, access control, IT suppliers, etc. and rarely if ever does a packet capture ever get requested, used if supplied, or even understood by them.
I have a networked sound system in work (a school) that does school bells, etc. It works on Ethernet/PoE. It wouldn't work properly, so I packet-captured and highlighted that it doesn't join multicast groups properly.
Nobody cared, I just got told to turn to "turn off IGMP snooping" as a default techy script.
Supplied said packet capture to Cisco because we have cloud managed switches and IGMP snooping is on by default, they took one look and turned it off stating that the devices were just shit and there was nothing else they could do.
Same again when a SIP trunk wouldn't punch through our network to the Internet no matter what settings we used. Ended up just using another SIP provider that didn't need NAT-proxies, port-exceptions and the like and "just worked" through an ordinary firewall (Gamma). The telephony companies Hipcom shit literally NEVER worked, not even once, not with all the packet captures in the world going back and forth showing that we were sending the packets out and getting fuck-all back. I reset the firewall to blank settings, we plugged in the Gamma SIP address, everything worked with ZERO settings. Guess who got the SIP telephony contract.
Packet captures are like debug logs and memory dumps. Nobody cares, the one guy who could understand them left the company years ago, so they just stab at the usual answers and blame the customer.
Before I retired my speciality was making sense of very large packet captures.
There were several occasions when one of our customers was having a problem - that I diagnosed as being in the WAN "cloud" of their third party major network supplier.
My company then had to send me with my equipment to help the network supplier. Apparently they had no one with reasonable equipment and the knowledge to diagnose what was going wrong in their network.
It seemed to be a trend after about 2000 for people to guess "the answer" - rather than establishing factual evidence and identifying a root cause.
I still do, been using network traces for decades. It's getting harder though. First, there was the move from hubs (and token ring) to switches (and Ethernet) so you couldn't just sniff all the traffic from another host on the same LAN segment. For some years, I carried around a crappy old hub and a crossover cable (remember those too?) to intercept traffic.
Nowadays you need to persuade the network guy the SPAN switch ports for you, which can delay things to such an extent that you start installing sniffers on the affected host... which can and does sometimes have its own side effects, such as differences in where the stack is executed in promiscuous mode (NIC or OS).
Then almost all traffic became TLS/SSL making it more difficult to trace application layer problems from network traces.
It still has its place, but I use interactive network traces a lot less than I used to because of both the political and the technical challenges around getting it set up in the enterprise. In the development phase I use them much more frequently on the local host.
They can be exceptionally useful tools. Despite the pervasive use of TLS, often you don't need to know anything about the payload data at all, just seeing the conversation metadata is enough to determine if you have a client-side or server-side problem. I rarely see people use sniffers nowadays though, they're more likely to hit Google.
As DHCP negotiations are in the clear, it would be easy to identify which side of the conversation was at fault.
My laptop had the problem this morning, I should've fired up wireshark/netmon. Instead I followed the instructions and rebooted like a good script kiddie, and it fixed it.
I suspect just a reboot or two fixes it, as I discovered that the update was requesting one, and this is what the nub of the problem is. The update itself gets applied but needs a reboot which is delayed, so DHCP breaks in the process. After the DHCP lease time expires, or the machine comes out of sleep or hibernation, the DHCP request fails because the update needed a proper reboot to finish and work properly. Hence, machine cannot connect to the LAN or t'internet.
"Same again when a SIP trunk wouldn't punch through our network to the Internet no matter what settings we used. Ended up just using another SIP provider that didn't need NAT-proxies, port-exceptions and the like and "just worked" through an ordinary firewall (Gamma). The telephony companies Hipcom shit literally NEVER worked, not even once, not with all the packet captures in the world going back and forth showing that we were sending the packets out and getting fuck-all back. I reset the firewall to blank settings, we plugged in the Gamma SIP address, everything worked with ZERO settings. Guess who got the SIP telephony contract."
Guess who's just stuck a hammer through their network security? You need to use a Session Border Controller. Think about the implications of the set-up you've created and why you shouldn't put SIP and RTP through a firewall.
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Well I use linux as servers, probably not your usual end user thing. I do say the the linux gui's are IMTO lacking.
As for the walled garden, you are in one with Microsoft.
Now I cannot guarantee that you will find the software you need for your requirements, but surely its worth a look?
Being a creative I have a choice between MAC and Windows, and I sure as hell ain't getting into the Apple walled garden.
First off, what Linux people do is build the platform on which people like you can whine at others. Every time you use a platform that has to handle serious volume there is a high chance you talk to stuff that has originated from some people bashing out some code on Linux, sometimes just for the hell of it - a bit like musicians like to jam occasionally.
Secondly, you choose your poison. Personally I won't touch Microsoft ever again because I need to get work done and I don't have a fortune to waste, nor time. Apple gear tends to be costly upfront, but after that you don't waste much time messing around, the software tends to cost less and it's more focused on creatives than Microsoft's view of the world.
However, that's my personal opinion and experience, if Microsoft works for you, by all means stick with it - I agree with you that Linux as a desktop is not really for the fainthearted, nor does it attract the sort of pro software that you need (it's a bit of a chicken and egg problem that seems impossible to fix). Just don't spout the walled garden nonsense as if Microsoft is somehow more open - as far as I can tell they invented the concept of lock in and got nice and fat off it (Microsoft Office formats are a good example). Apple is at least Open Standards compliant - I have iOS and macOS devices all hanging off Open Source groupware and happily sync across using IMAP, caldav and carddav - no need for ActiveSync crud.
Because that's where Linux works very well indeed.
Is this a sign of the bloatware/unnecessary code to come in Windows 10 Creators Edition?
The problem now seems to be the size of the cumulative updates, the amount of free space you need to install them (which with SSD sizes, means you don't always have lots of free space).
You need to have at least 1GB-2GB of free space on the C: drive to install this update. It's also a bit glitchy. It can partially install, if it has enough space to download, but not enough space to install. Then give odd messages in Windows Update, that it still needs to restart to install, when its just restarted.
Give KB3201845 plenty of free space to install, it seems to need a lot more than most Windows 10 'normal' updates, (rather than say, version upgrades i.e 1511 > 1607 which need lots too)
Once installed, I didn't have a problem with DHCP.
I don't use fast boot though, as its a multi-OS bootable machine. Other OS's don't seem to like seeing Microsoft's Win10 suspended state NTFS filesystem, including Win 7, which mark it as dirty in fast boot mode. Netgear Router, don't use Sky/Talktalk/BT/Plusnet as my ISP.
I'm still OK after KB3201845 has gone on. I don't use fast-start up either as I found my portable USB hard drive and I think also mouse were still receiving power after 'shutting down' my self-built PC with that option turned on.
I figured that the time spent working out why would never be repaid by the imperceptibly faster start-up times so I just switched it off.
It's a good practice too to recheck all Privacy Settings after each and every MS Update/Upgrade. They don't always preserve their past privacy values. (Microsoft Amnesia)
Seems to be a greyed option for me:
Send Microsoft info about how I write to help us improve typing and writing in the future.
Read that Privacy setting Switch as 'Enable Keylogger'.
Seems pretty stupid too if that Keylogger code is 'sitting idle', there to be enabled at any time too. If there was ever a line, MS Privacy settings past it a long time ago. ICO in the UK is utterly useless, just try their live chat.
Fast boot is a stupid name, because its actually shutdown that is slower without fast boot. Booting with an SSD (without fast boot) makes little difference.
Does seem like disabling fast boot might be a good first step in resolving this. (Not easy to find in Win10 either, so here you go readers)
Windows 10
Control Panel -> Power Options -> Change what the Power Buttons Do.
Then select Change Settings that are currently unavailable (next to small shied symbol)
Unclick 'Turn on fast startup'
Save Changes
I'm stuck with Comcast here, and I have a Netgear router. The other day my Windows 10 machine was getting an IP address in a wrong subnet, and there was some truly weird stuff in the arp cache. No, of course renewing the DHCP lease didn't fix anything. I suspect with basically no evidence it's something to do with IPv6 support since about that time I also started seeing DHCP allocating me an IPv6 address on the internal network.
....UK/European citizens from unscupulous software vendors incompetence?
Given than many people ended up being "upgraded" to windows 10 because it was forced down their throats one would have thought that said GOV agency would be hot on the case of fixing MS's wagon.
WinX is not "free", you were required to have an existing MS OS so I would say MS are still liable for damages irrespective of any EULA they may also have forced upon their "upgraders"
Bloody hell, I have been having this trouble for about three weeks with Zen. I assumed it was my Billion router on it's way out.
The problem seems to have stabilised for the past week, but only after reinstalling the firmware numerous times.
Win 10, latest updates
Billion Bipac 7800DXL
Zen Internet Almostbroadband.
The entire windows update experience for windows 10 is a joke. This attempt to dumb down everything into one monolithic update is plain stupid. Windows 7 update is now almost completely broken - I've tried to get one of my systems to update and after five hours its still stuck on 0% downloaded. Anniversary update failed on both machines, and its not unusual for updates on win 10 to fall over half way through.
Contrast this with linux mint. Seconds to download and install. Clear update notes and bug reports, easy individual roll back, and advice ratings on stability vs security. This is how it should be done - take note microsoft. If you can't produce reliable code these days then at least make sure users can easily fix things. Removing f8 safemode booting doesn't exactly help....
I have rebuilt a few Win7 boxen recently, starting with SP1 CD (or preinstall), then installing the Convenience update rollup (http://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx?q=3125574), then letting Windows Update have a go. With Office installed and set to update, the average runtime for this entire process is 36-48 hours - but it does succeed.
Needless to say I wouldn't be seen dead running an MS OS myself. But those who pay me are adamant that it's their only option, and they pay me by the hour - so I can live with it, as long as they agree to stick with Win7, and not touch Win10 with the longest of bargepoles.
I see failure on friend's daughter's computer.
Virgin Media as ISP, Acer comp. Win10 (7upgrade!) normally, then moved location Leeds to Warrington..
Computer moved to family house with BT as ISP. Internet connection failed. 20161208&20161209.
Virgin 'down' in places due Win 10 upgrade, but this is Machine that does not connect to internet on local BT router. Reset, reboot does not clear.
This isn't just a UK problem, it's a global issue:
http://www.golem.de/news/kein-internet-nach-windows-update-weltweit-computer-offline-1612-124990.html
(it seems German's media is a bit more thorough when researching issues)
In short, MS hosed up DHCP in one of the updates.
I don't quite understand...
I have read the article a couple of times and it doesn't help that I'm ill with a bad cold. (sniff sniff)
I am not an expert, and just a user.
I don't understand why Windows is to blame.
Could someone (sbiff spiff) just dumb it dowbn for me please?
I'm asking because our home system is a Plusnet Router, I use Windows 10 Pro.
Also, I thought that recently buying a 2860 Draytek router (not taken the PlusNet router's place and connected up yet) it was reasonably resilient... and I want to be clear in my (sniff sniff) mind.
DHCP is the usual way to set up your computer (and other things) to connect to the local network, and thus to the Internet.
Your computer sends out a request "Please tell me how to connect to the network" and a list of information about itself.
Your router then replies to the request with "Yes of course, this is how..." and a list of settings to use.
Your computer then replies with "Thankyou, I will use these settings..." and a list of the settings it will use.
If any of those lists are wrong (or misunderstood), it won't work.
If either side doesn't send the question or response in a timely fashion, it won't work.
"Why is Windows to blame?"
Microsoft recently pushed an update for Windows 8 and 10 which is causing some of the systems which receive it to muck up the procedure Richard described. The result being that those systems no longer successfully connect to networks.
Since you're using Windows 10 you'd be well advised to note the two commands at the foot of the article which seem to resolve the problem, while you have an internet connection, in case you need them later.
I'm normally a Linux user, but been using Windows 10 since release. Updated last night and had no problem with connection, and thats on virgin media. As a matter of fact I haven't had one problem with windows 10 since I've been using it (about July 2015) even with everything I've read about.
My sister is a Plusnet & Win10 customer and had this problem about a month ago. Since we were both planning to visit our mother, my sister brought her laptop for me to "debug". But Mum's with TalkTalk on a Hauwei router and everything worked perfectly.
Of course, when she went home, Windows wouldn't connect again. She was told by Plusnet that they were trialling a software upgrade to her Technicolor TG582n and would "put her on the list". It's all been working since then.
(As it happens, I got the exact same model of router from my ISP, Phone Co-Op, but I have no Windows in here.)
"That kinda makes me wonder what kind of person reads theregister these days."
Ahem - several people made that same point yesterday.
Network protocols have long been a minor part of IT expertise - an arcane black art in most IT people's book. The days when a person could have reasonable competence in all aspects of IT were probably over by 1960.
Understanding how IT systems work at all levels requires a wide experience with depth in some areas. Since speciality certification became the route to quick career progression - the youngsters have found it wasn't worth taking the unrewarded broad approach.
Like self-driving cars - people bought into the network monitor suppliers' "expert systems". They believed whatever conclusion the analysis application gave them. They didn't develop the ability to think for themselves.
"it could just be that Windows is ignoring something in the response. Wireshark won't show you that."
It *might* be. But without something like Wireshark, in general folk are just guessing.
Of course, given that it's Windows 10 (and only Windows 10) that's affected, there'd be a very strong case for guessing that Windows 10 is at fault.
"[...] there'd be a very strong case for guessing that Windows 10 is at fault."
On the other hand it may be that W10 is doing something by the book - and has exposed a long standing problem in a common DHCP implementation. It's amazing how many times you can suddenly hit a solid bug - and find that it's been there for 20 years.
" Wireshark won't show you that."
In diagnosing a system problem you use whatever tools are available to look at various points in the chain in a methodical fashion. Like a binary chop - you start at both ends and then narrow the gap between the points until you have isolated the failing area.
It can be hard work nowadays - as it is often difficult to gain access to the optimum points.
In this case an analysis of a Wireshark capture would show how much of the PC/Router's traffic was as expected. If the PC failed to behave in the expected way at any point then the investigation moves towards, or inside, the PC. The router may still eventually be the culprit - or like many system problems it may be a case that both ends are at fault in some way.
You also learn to be wary that diagnostic tools can tell porkies under some circumstances. That's where experience counts.
The old saying is still true: "Don't believe anything someone else says they have seen - and only believe half of what you think you have seen yourself".
Indeed.
I didn't see this article till just now (middle of Sunday morning, UK time). I got about a page and a half in before wondering why no-one's done any actual evidence-based troubleshooting; I guess it requires too much effort, let alone understanding.
The early responders seem to have come with the benefit of modern IT thinking - "turn it off and on again". And unfortunately they also mostly seem to have been unaware that Win10 "shutdown" isn't actually a shutdown, more a save-to-disk for later (I'd wondered about that based on my own previous observations on other people's Win10 systems).
Upvotes (and pints) to all those who pointed out the appropriate method for making a Win10 shutdown an actual shutdown.
My Windows 10 laptop was unable to get a DHCP address yesterday after powering on, either from my Virgin Media Hub 3 or from the hotspot on my Galaxy S5, so I knew the problem was with Windows. A quick google search (after setting a static IP) turned up the following page: http://www.sysprobs.com/fixed-windows-10-limited-connectivity-not-getting-ip-from-dhcp. The following commands and a reboot got my DHCP working again:
netsh int tcp set heuristics disabled
netsh int tcp set global autotuninglevel=disabled
netsh int tcp set global rss=enabled
finally!!
I have had this issue sporadically for months. Asus N16 router, plusnet and used to be set as DHCP, changed desktop to static months ago and it fizzled out. I eventually set up static WAN addressing with plusnet also (simpler for home VPN) along with DNS servers and haven't looked back.
disabling the Intel NIC for a few seconds seemed to resolve it, when affected i couldnt even hit the IP of the router.
W10 claiming no internet, yet all other wireless devices (non-Win) were perfectly fine.
Seriously MS stop being inept fuckwitts (more than the norm) A tall order I know :)
By default Win 8 and 10 give priority to IPv6, BT/PlusNet do not officially support v6 for all customers so this may relate to local ISP connection support for v6 and 6 tunnel weighting.
It doesn't mention if the problem is the same with IPv6 disabled or the geographical distribution of the issue.
I assume with BT's ongoing adoption of v6 users in the city may fare differently to those in the sticks.
The BT routers may pass the v6 packets without any firewalling or filtering, those with routers who "do a bit more" with the traffic or stop LAN devices getting addreses from the ISP don't see the issue (?). If it was a v4 issue it should not be affected while behind v4 NAT.
Typed from a Win8 box via one of the affected ISP's but third party router and DHCP setup.
This afternoon on the kitchen table:
Two Lenovo Thinkpads - T430 and Yoga 260 (work machine) - both running Windows 10 - fine
A Samsung series 5 laptop (another work machine) running Windows 7 - won't connect
A Lynx W10 tablet - won't connect
ISP is Plusnet but router is TP-Link Archer
I have had a few occasions when my W7 PC had apparently established a network connection - but had obtained very strange IP addresses. My tentative guess was that the Edimax N300 wi-fi ethernet bridge had picked up a neighbour's "open" router. DHCP had then worked for the PC - but it had been denied internet access. Hasn't happened enough times to want to spend time establishing what exactly happened.
Not just BT routers. Just had the same thing happen to me and I am using a Draytek 2850. After rebooting the PC it was able to pull an IP address.
interestingly when doing ipconfig /renew I got "An error occurred when renewing the interface Ethernet : The system cannot find the file specified."
I'd been struggling with one laptop doing this for weeks. Customer kept calling me back time and time again. In the end I fixed it by downloading the latest wireless drivers from the laptop supplier (the Win10 automatic upgrade had installed a different set, while the default Broadcom drivers were also bad) and also set the router to give a fixed DHCP address for this one machine.
I couldn't give it a fixed IP address because it was used on other networks - where it behaved.
It appeared to be a combination of the default Microsoft wireless drivers for Broadcom chipsets and the BT Homehub
This post has been deleted by its author
What's wrong with you?
Why on earth are you trying to blame the users/Ubuntu for yet another M$ forced-fuckup? Most of the (100% M$ Windows using) victims of this latest M$ failure have clearly not installed any non-M$ OS.
"it's all just assumptions and 0 facts" - Are you referring to your own post in that sentence fragment? Perhaps you should look up "non sequitur" then review your post?
My wife Acer ultrabook (Windows 10) had this issue on Wednesday (We're on Sky Broadband), i can confirm that no amount of turning it off and on again worked... spotted the local link ip address and guessed something was up... I randomly change the DNS entries to Googles (8.8.8.8, 8.8.4.4) and it started working :+1:
I also disabled the IPv6 adapter as Sky Broadband very kindly defaults to them :)
DNS has nothing to do with DHCP (just, DHCP can set the DNS servers along the IP/subnet/gateway/etc.) - if you don't get a valid IP/subnet/gateway, you won't be able to reach any DNS server (nor any other device).
Using Google DNS is just a way to let it know about any and every host you contact - and then people complain about MS data slurp....
It's happened to my parents PC (using Sky Q Hub) and a friends (Virgin Media) both within 24 hours of each other.
Thought it was McAfee AV at first as they both use it (I know!) and after removing the software the computers were able to get an IP via DHCP and all is OK.
Wondering if removing the AV has reset something in the TCP stack?
Going to reintroduce software next week, see if it borks again.
I had a neighbour with this problem last weekend.
They had been sent a replacement router from BT but still had problems.
I changed their Windows 10 PC to use google's DNS servers and everything started working again.
All my windows PC's use fixed DNS servers and I've not run into this problem so far.
I've not had any real issues with my HH4 and FTTC. The only real issue I have with the HH4 is the complete lack of being able to configure them to my liking, such as pointing at a set of DNS servers that are not BTs. Any suggestions?
WTF ?
I have fixed multiple systems over the past year with this exact issue, computer is connected, be it wifi or ethernet, and you get a 169.254.x.y IP address ... the solution ?
netsh winsock reset
Problem solved ... I had it on my Window 8 (about 8 months ago) and Windows 10 (two weeks ago) boxes, and have helped acquaintances with this ... reboot does NOT help, a winsock settings cockup, and no, I had not changed any network settings.
Mind, the other day I changed the docker virtual switch to connect to the internet directly, to use hyperv, and I had 93% packet loss (from within the VM, 0% [as in, no problem at all] from within the host) ... not sure about the reliability of the Windows 10 TCP/IP stack ...
I've experienced this issue this weekend and I'm on Virgin Media.
3 laptops - Toshiba Sat Pro, Sony Vaio and a Dell Ultrabook.
The Tosh and Sony have been fine after update but the Dell refused point blank to connect to the wireless network. It could see the wireless networks (Virgin routers provide 2 networks, named 2G and 5G) but the only connection it would make was using Vodafone mobile (there's a 4G SIM in it).
Reboot of the laptop and restarting the router sorted it but it was confusing (and annoying) for those few minutes.
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