Strange computer happenings (Help Please)

Factual Questions
1

I feel like a very computer-savvy person, so please feel free to use any terms or any degree of complexity.

I have two computers that I networked with an ethernet cable. Desktop ----Laptop. My cable modem was connected to my desktop by USB. The desktop (winXP) was using internet connection sharing to give internet to both computers. OK. No problem. This setup was working fine for about 3 or 4 weeks. Then suddenly, this morning, the laptop no longer connects to the internet. Also, it cannot do file sharing with the desktop (both do not recognize each other).

I have no idea what happened. I’m the only one here and I didn’t change anything. Regardless of how I went from a perfectly stable, working setup to this… How can I fix it? When I go to the Network Properties --> my LAN card, the box for internet connection sharing is unchecked. When I check it and then hit apply I get "An error occurred while internet connection sharing was being enabled. The dependency service or group failed to start."

I did a google on this phrase and it seems that other have gotten this message, but no word on how to fix it. I appreciate you reading this far and I’m open to any suggestions.

p.s. I have checked the cables.

2

Check the Event Log to see exactly which service had a problem. Look in the Services applet of Administrative Tools (Win2K - hope it’s the same under XP) for a service related to Internet connection sharing - look at its properties to see what the dependent service might be.

3

That error message is pretty generic. DarrenS suggests an excellent place to start. You should be able to find a red stop error in the system log that will indicate the service that failed. We can go from there.

Also - here is an MS KB article that may be of help:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;308006

4

deathawk & DarrenS, thanks so much for your responses. I went to the services applet in the administrator control panel. Thanks to your suggestion, I found that Telephony was, for some reason, disabled. This, of course, is a dependent of ICS!

Well, a little restart and Voila! Everything back to normal. Thanks you guys, it would have taken me a while to figure all that out.