Networking woes with Netgear's RT314's DHCP server

[AncientPC]

FYI the RT314's your standard router/switch combo with it's own DHCP server.

PC1 = WinXP Pro, Netgear FA310TX network card
PC2 = WinXP Pro, Netgear FA311 network card
PC3 = Win2k Pro, Netgear FA311 network card
PC4 = Win98SE, D-link crap card

The RT314's DHCP server is turned on.

PC1 is running under DHCP and shows up under RT314's DHCP table.

PC2 cannot find a DHCP server. However, I can manually set the network card to use 192.168.0.1 (the router's IP) as the gateway and manually assign the IP address.

PC3 is the same situation as PC2.

However, PC3 can't see PC1 or PC2 in the same workgroup but can access the computers directly via \\PC1 and \\PC2.

PC4 is the same situation as PC3.

Any reason why only PC1 can run DHCP while the others can't?

 

[Slogun]

Wow, that's a good question.

I've got that same router and it's always been a simple matter of plug and play. Never had a problem with any of my five computers showing up in the DHCP table and they're all a combination of WinXP Pro and Win98SE.

I suppose you have tried powering down the router for a good couple of minutes.

Only other thing I can think of is to try a firmware upgrade.

 

[sml]

Start up a sniffer and troubleshoot; capture a successful DHCP session [UDP broadcasts to 255.255.255.255 from the system, getting response back, etc] and then from an unsuccessful one. What's different? post results and I'll be glad to help you deduce.

 

[AncientPC]

I'm running firmware v3.25.

I've unplugged and replugged PC1 into the 3 other ports, release and renew and all the ports work. But if the network card and cat5 cable was bad, then I still wouldn't be able to set it up manually.

As for the a network sniffer, I'm aware of the concept but I don't believe the Netgear FA311 have packet sniffing built-in. Is there another program I can use that you could recommend?

 

[sml]

Ethereal should work great for you. Be sure to capture in tcpdump compatible format.