At about 5 P.M. and change every day, my cable internet disconnects. I don’t how long it disconnects for, but it requires a restart of my computer every time. Is this a (relatively) benign virus?
I use, update and run regularly Spybot S&D, Spyware Blaster, Ad-Aware 6, and Norton Antivirus 2003 (with the Live Update enabled). I run WinXP as my OS.
Forgot to add—I use ZoneAlarm Free Edition as well.
That’s odd.
Are you running any scheduled jobs around 5PM every day?
If not, have you called your ISP and asked them to troubleshoot?
Also, you shouldn’t have to restart the computer. You should be able to fire up the command tool and renew the connection:
start > programs > accessories > command prompt
type in “ipconfig /renew”
That should renew your IP address and restart the connection.
I used to have the same problem: dial-up connection about 02:30AM every Sunday morning. I think it was because of standard maintenance being run by either the phone company or the ISP. I have to admit though, 5PM would be a strange time to run maintenance.
Do you have a cable modem that shows connction status? Do the lights on the front of the cable modem look the same when it’s out, vs when it’s working?
Yes, the lights look the same: Power, Cable, and PC lights are on, and the Data light blinks merrily as usual.
Mine used to go out at 7 pm each day. Finally convinced my ISP that it was a weak signal problem at their end. They eventually fixed it (took 12 months of convincing).
Just a WAG, but have an investigation of all timed electrical appliances in your house and maybe neighbours.
There could be something old and ‘noisy’ switching itself on around that time and it’s causing enough upheaval in the electrical supply or electro-magnetic spectrum to interfer with your cable’s signal.
I’ve heard of cases like this.
Shut down your fire wall just before this time and see if it still happens. I was dropping my connection regularly and got off my firewall and haven’t had a reocurrence since.
Many home hardware firewall/routers have a builtin timeout feature that disconnects after x interval. If you’re using software PPoE that may have a similar feature.
I’d be surprised to see a feature that caused a timeout at a particular clock time, but if you’re always using your PC at around 5pm AND the timeout is set for 24 hours, then you’d get in a cycle where it appeared to be based on clock time, but it was really just 24 hours after reboot.
My suggestion would be to look into the configuration settings of your PPoE connection, be that software or in the router. You may find a hint there.
It may also be the case that the ISP automatically terminates every connection every so often at their end. It’d be a tactic to prevent / discourage home users from trying to run an internet business over their cable, i.e. “You want continuous 100% reliable connections? Upgrade to our business service for only 3x the money”.
Finally, 5pm is near peak usage for a cable ISP system. Some piece of equipment at their end may have a limit as to how many users can be logged on. So around 5pm as everyone comes home and fires up their PC, the user count hits the limit and the system bounces the oldest connections to make room for the newest. That logic would be a simple way for the machine to “recycle” dead connections that would otherwise simply fill it up.
These are all just educated guesswork, so good luck.