Troubleshooting internet connectivity in a network environment.

Ah, the old favorite, "I can’t connect to the internet."  In my last post on printers, I covered the basics of checking to make sure the connections were tight.  I don’t want to spend much time on that, but obviously, the same “start with the simplest explanation” concept applies.  Why’ll we’re at it,  what are some other simple explanations for why a user’s internet is not working?  Here’s a few examples:

It actually is working,  but it’s just one site that’s down.

Solution:  Either wait it out, or if the site is mission critical,  get in contact with their support.

It is working but a specific site(s) is having browser issues

Solution:  Varies, but often involves enabling cookies, SSL , TSL, or switching to a different browser, if that’s allowed in your environment.

The user is trying to get on to a blocked site.

Explain that the company firewall is designed to keep everyone safe and productive, but if the site is blocked in error, we can petition IT and regular management for changes in policy.  Notice that claims of “internet not working”  can mean a lot of things to an end user.

The user has internet service, but can’t connect to intranet site, such as a file server

Solution:  Varies, but the first step is to confirm that the server isn’t having general issues, not specific to the user.  The second step is to ask the user to refresh the connection to test, and then restart the computer.  Restarts will often fix these issues, as inelegant as it seems.  The third step is to check permission settings on the file server.  Is the user part of a group that is denied permission to the server? 

The user has general connectivity issues.

For the sake of argument, let’s say the obvious solutions have been tested.     I like to use the ping command from Command Prompt to see if a user’s IP  can be reached from my computer.  If it can, that’s a sign that the network cabling between us is intact.   If not,  we need to investigate further.  From the user’s computer,  you can use the command ping google.com

You can also try to ping a public DNS server  (above)

    Ping is working loud and clear for me.  Seeing this would rule out general connectivity issues.  If it stalls and never connects, it’s a sign that A:  a network cable, possibly at the network rack, is unplugged,  or B:  Your network’s security apparatus has decided it doesn't like the end user and has blocked his IP or MAC address.

To remedy this, you should check to see if the wiring corresponding to the user’s data port has made it to the network switch uninterrupted.  One of your co-workers may have gotten adventurous when rearranging things and left the user unplugged.  A security administrator will have to change settings on a firewall if the user is currently blocked.    

    If none of this resolves the issue, then I would break out a technician laptop and see if it is able to connect at the users work area.  If it can connect, it narrows the issue down to the user’s personal computer.   From there, I’d move the user’s computer to a test area, ideally connected directly to the internet and not through our intranet.  If the user has a virus, we don’t want it spreading through the office.  The network interface card would be the likely culprit if it’s a hardware problem.  If it’s not lighting up at the point where the Ethernet cord is plugged in, that’s a sure sign it is not working.

Lastly there’s a chance the PC is infected with a virus.   Dealing with viruses will be the subject of a future post.    
    As you can see, internet connectivity issues are a broad set of issues, with many possible points of failure.  I’ve undoubtedly neglected a few.    On the whole, the most important thing is to communicate with the user about the true nature of the problem.   It’s by far the most time saving step.

Troubleshooting printers.

Printers are one of the most common sources of trouble for the IT help desk.   Luckily, most of the problems are not that hard to diagnose. 

EX. Caller:  Mr. Tech, My printer is dead!  It won’t print anything.

Note that your customers/co-workers may be prone to hyperbole when they describe their problems.  That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be taken seriously.  It just means a diagnosis must cover the basics before more complex solutions.

Mr.  Tech- Okay ma’am/sir, what were you working on when it decided to quit on you?

Notice I’m getting information from the caller without making her defensive about what happened; the printer breaking was an event that happened to her.

Caller:  I was printing a large document, and was cleaning off my desk while I waited.  It just stopped right in the middle of it!

The simplest solution is probably the correct one here.   The correct course of action is to have the caller check all the connections to the printer.  It was likely knocked loose while cleaning.     First, have her navigate to printers and devices.  From there, she can tell you if there are any warnings that her printer is offline.     With that knowledge in hand, she should check all of her connections, and turn her printer off and back on.  If loose connections were ever the problem, that would solve it.

In the above graphic,  A faded out printer means it’s no longer connected.   A warning sign means it has detected problems,  for example,  a driver that is no longer working.

Caller-  It’s just got this warning sign,  everything is connected and it still won’t print!

If there is a warning sign, the best thing to do is right click the printer, click troubleshoot, and let Windows do some of the work for you.  The two most common solutions windows comes up with are: “The print spooler service has stopped working” and “The device driver has stopped working” The first will start the print service automatically, though it can be turned on manually.  The second will try to download a driver for you.    In my experience, a restart is the best way to get the print spooler back on track.  A restart has the advantage of often curing other ills, like memory issues or malfunctioning usb ports. 

Caller:  Okay it tried to download a driver and it just says “driver failed to install properly.” 

At this point, some hands on maintenance is needed.  The technician should right click the printer in “devices and printers” and uninstall it.  Then, the tech should install the printer from the original disk or manually downloading the software. 

As a next to last resort, try changing out the USB cord.  It’s rare but they do go bad. 

As a last resort, you should hook up the printer to a test station and see if it works there.  That will determine if the printer itself is a clunker or if it’s an error on the user’s computer.

That’s the core of the troubleshooting process for the large majority of issues on a local printer.  A network printer is its own animal.  It opens up its own issues of internet connectivity,  the IP address of the printer,  and if the priority the user has over other users printing at the same time.  That, my friends,  will be the subject of another post.  This post is primarily focused on issues of network connectivity,  paper jams,  dead printers, and toner issues are best discussed in your printers documentation.