A friend suggested to remove any security from the network, and just enable the "MAC Filters" option.
I entered my pc's MAC address in there and it looks like its working.
I've done so for my sister's laptop as well, but it's not working either... and yes, I did enter the 2 MAC addresses of her laptop.

... still stuck on that "Limited connection: local connection only".

Well, MAC addresses can be spoofed. Plus your signals are still being broadcast unencrypted for everyone to see.

The guy told me it was pretty much one of the best thing I could do for protection. D:
So people can create fake MAC addresses that would copy mine?

In terms of security strength, it basically goes like this:
Unsecured, WEP
MAC access-list (what you have now)
WPA, WPA2, other advanced encryption protocols

Unsecured is completely unencrypted data - anyone can eavesdrop on you and see what you're doing online and anyone can connect to your router and steal your internet.

WEP is weak encryption that is very easily broken (within 5 minutes), after which anyone can eavesdrop on you and see what you're doing online, and anyone can connect to your router and steal your internet.

MAC access-lists is completely unencrypted data - anyone can eavesdrop on you and see what you're doing online. However to connect to your router and steal your internet connection, they need to spoof your MAC address. Because your data is completely unencrypted, this isn't difficult at all. If they spoof your MAC address, this would tend to interfere with your own connection somewhat, so you'd probably notice something odd like websites failing to load or going very slow etc. But if there was a laptop that you seldom used, they could spoof that MAC and therefore you normally wouldn't notice any issues.

WPA, WPA2 etc encrypt data packets individually. If the encryption is broken (very time-consuming, difficult) the worst they can do is see the contents of that specific packet. Packets are max 1500 bytes so they might see a small part of a website or the middle of a txt document or MP3 or whatever. No one can steal your internet unless they know your WPA password.

You can combine MAC access-lists with WPA security if you want, but because WPA is very strong there really isn't much point. It's like putting a regular wooden door without a lock on it after your moat and drawbridge to keep people out. It's also annoying if a friend comes over and wants to use the internet - you have to enter their MAC address into your router or they can't connect. If you just use WPA all they have to do is put in the password (which you can change after your friend leaves if you don't trust them).

Double post!!

"... still stuck on that "Limited connection: local connection only"."

That's because the laptop can't get an IP address from the DHCP server on your router, so is defaulting to use a 169.254.x.x address, which I've said several times in this thread already.

You haven't made it clear whether the laptop can actually connect to the router or not at all - what the signal strength is, whether it can pick up the SSID or anything.

Actually it is worse than that - I heard long ago that you could get the key in 40 seconds by transmitting stuff that would cause the router to send out more packets, making it possible to get the data you need to crack it even faster.

Her laptop connects to the router (or I believe so... at least, it says "Connected" to the wireless network). The signal's strength is labeled as "Excellent". I do see the SSID (which is the name of the network, right? "default", and stuff like that?).

Now, considering I'm a total fucktard in regards to networking, if you do understand the problem, please understand that saying "your IP should be static" doesn't mean much to me; I need precisions.

Yes, well this is the first time you'd actually provided something concrete I can go on.

First thing to try (not likely to work): go into cmd and type:
ipconfig /release
ipconfig /renew

That will attempt to get a new IP address from the DHCP server. Probably if you can't get an address to begin with, this won't help.

The next thing that almost certainly will work, requires a little more effort, and isn't a great solution if you sister uses her laptop elsewhere than your house. But it should at least confirm that the laptop can handle WPA2 and work with your router.

On your router, you need to find the DHCP Server configuration part. There will be a pool or range of IP addresses. Based on the IP address you gave earlier (192.168.0.1) I would guess that this range is probably 192.168.0.2 - 192.168.0.128. But it could be any block of IP addresses, like 192.168.0.2 to 192.168.0.255. If you can see that this is only configured with a single address (ie, only 1 computer can connect at a time), then that is likely your problem - increase the range so it's bigger than 1 IP address. I wouldn't expect there would only be 1 IP address, but you might have configured something wrong.

Once you've found out what the range is, you need to pick an IP address that is outside the range, but still in the same subnet. If the range is 192.168.0.2 - 192.168.1.128, then you can use IP address 192.168.1.130. If the range is the full block of 255 addresses, from 192.168.0.2 to 192.168.0.255 then you'll need to modify the top end of the range so it's smaller, like 128. If your range was 192.168.0.10 to 192.168.0.80 for example, then you could use 192.168.0.90 or .81 or .83, just as long as it wasn't inside that range in the DHCP server on the router (or you could get IP address conflicts).

Once you've found an IP address outside the pool but still in the same subnet, you need to apply this as a static address to your sister's wireless connection. Here's screenshot instructions for how to change it in Vista: http://portforward.com/networking/static-vista.htm Skip to step 5 because the earlier steps won't help you on your sister's computer anyway.

For the IP address you'll want the one we found earlier, eg 192.168.0.130. The netmask will be 255.255.255.0 (windows will probably fill that in for you automatically) and the default gateway will be the IP address of your router, which should be 192.168.0.1 (from info you provided earlier). For DNS and alternate DNS, put in 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4. These are google's DNS servers so they'll work for you just fine - ideally you should use your ISP ones, but for the sake of just getting your connection working, google's will be fine.

Why would the DHCP server be having conflicts? Unless payne's original computer is set with the static IP address the DHCP server is trying to assign to his sister's...?
or maybe your hacker friend is fucking with ur networks :prof:

The DHCP on the router was configured to lease addresses for 1 week from the pool 192.168.0.100 - 192.168.0.200. This apparently works since the LAN connection in payne's screenshot got 192.168.0.101.
And yes, the WLAN is able to connect, but with limited connectivity.

Thanks Nude, that makes it easier.

Assign a static IP address of 192.168.0.50 to your sisters' wireless connection, netmask 255.255.255.0, DNS 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4. That should work, and if it doesn't, then there is probably a problem with either the router or the laptop, possibly with the laptop not properly supporting WPA or WPA2 or the password being typed in incorrectly or something silly like that. Given that you've apparently turned all encryption off and are only using MAC access-lists but still can't connect, it's a bit worrying.


The server itself wouldn't be having a conflict. My suggestions above were to make sure you assigned an IP address that did not conflict with the DHCP server. If you tell the DHCP server "give out addresses between 100 and 200", but the address 102 is already being statically used somewhere on the network, when the next PC comes along and says "give me an address" and the server gives out 102, the PC won't actually be able to use it because there'd be an IP address conflict on the network. Now DHCP servers and clients are supposed to be smart enough to solve this issue automatically (one or both should do a gratuitous ARP, determine it's unavailable and send/request another IP address) but it's better to avoid the problem to begin with.

I tried to set all those numbers in the IPv4 window.
Not quite sure if I have put them in the right place so that might be the reason why I still am not able to connect myself.
The image below isn't a screenshot of my settings. I just took it from internet.

We see 5 fields to fill in there. I have filled field #1, 2, 4 and 5 with the numbers you gave me, in the same order.

Also, somehow, her laptop now refuses to connect to internet even with the goddamn cable in.
I had taken a screenshot of the settings, but now I can't really post it (hence why the picture above is taken from internet)... >_>

P.S. I disabled the MAC filter and have set back up the WPA password thingy.

passerelle par default has to be your router's IP: 192.168.0.1

I don't know where you got the DNS servers from, but they might be correct. If they are your provider's DNS servers then it'll work, but to make sure take the Google DNS servers Lanth recommended: 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4.

GLORY!! INTERNET!!


50 minerals for Lanthanide and Nuderaider!

k.

Where did you even get the instruction to set your gateway to 254, anyhow?

Which protocol are you using? If you can go for WPA2, otherwise WPA seems to be fine too.

Isn't listed.

I've seen the router interface and it definitely has WPA2.

And it's a DI-624?

Payne says so.
All I can confirm is that it's a D-Link, but I haven't memorized the model.