Vista says wireless connectivity strong, but no Internet

I upgraded from XP to Vista last night. I use wireless to connect to a
broadband router in my home; I use IE7. Everything about Vista functions
perfectly, save the Internet. The signal strength is "excellent," and under
Networks and Sharing there is no indication of a problem (such as the red X
between my router and the Internet).

Yet when I open a browser and type in any web address, I get the page that
say "Cannot display webpage."

Why is this happening when everything claims to be functioning perfectly?
Do I need to download IE7 again?

First thing to do is to disable all addons and see if that fixes your
access. in IE7 Tools
Manage Add-ons
Enable or Disable Add-ons

Disable all the add-ons close and restart IE7, see if that works. If it does
you need to enable them one at a time till you find the bad one. You need to
close/open IE7 for each change, but you do not need to restart the computer.

If that doesn't work, try
Tools
Internet Options
Advanced
Reset (towards bottom)

Didn't work. I completely reset everything; there are no add-ons causing
trouble. When I restart IE7, the first thing it says is "The address is not
valid" (when I type in cnn.com, or whatever). Then I hit "home" and it says
"Cannot display webpage."

Didn't work. I reset everything; there are no add-ons causing the trouble.
When I restart IE7 and type an address (say, cnn.com), I get "not a valid
address." Then I hit "home" and the page says, "Cannot display the webpage."

I disabled everything in Startup. I have no download accelerator and no
spyware that my scrubbers can find. My connectivity still says excellent,
yet no site will open.

OK, try second stage of fixes.

In the command window (Windows Start Key-R, cmd)
try pinging the site
(ping cnn.com)

This should result in the DNS service providing an address
My Results: (note that timeout is OK, not all sites respond to a ping)

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.0.6000]
Copyright (c) 2006 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\Walraven>ping cnn.com

Pinging cnn.com [64.236.16.52] with 32 bytes of data:

Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.

Ping statistics for 64.236.16.52:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 0, Lost = 4 (100% loss),

You should get the same address as I get. Failure here is usually the result
of DNS problems.
Try using the actual address in IE7 (ie. http://64.236.16.52) and see if that works.

Next suggestion would be a download manager or spyware.
You could check in add/remove programs for anything that seems to be a
download manager or accelerator

Use msconfig command to selective startup without loading startup items.

You might also try asking for help in
microsoft.public.internetexplorer.general where many people have problems
with IE7 and there are even some solutions. (It looks to me an IE7 problem
rather than a 'vista' thing.)

(I have been assuming you are using this machine successfully for Windows
Mail for this conversation correct me if I am wrong).

Also disable any firewall and security suite for testing, be VERY carefull
where you browse while your protection is off.

Do NOT waste your time with the Alternate IP configuration options on the
wireless adapter. THEY FLAT DON'T WORK AT ALL in Vista.

If you have a wireless access point, and you KNOW it works on other
computers, but you get a "local only" message from Vista, the built-in DHCP
router in your Wireless Access Point probably is NOT compatible with Vista...
Here is one solution that may work for SOME routers (but it does NOT work for
all of them!)

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/928233/en-us

If this does not work, and you still get the "local only" message, but you
KNOW the access point works with XP wireless, etc., then MANUALLY SET the IP
address info. Unfortunately, if you have to manually set the IP info, you
will have to delete those settings with other wireless access points. And
let me say one more time, DO NOT waste your time with the Alternate IP
configuration, it doesn't work!

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/928152/en-us ; (affects mostly wireless on
laptops)
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929847/en-us ; (Vista and XP together in a
wireless environment)

If your Gateway is on a different subnet (usually locations with large
numbers of wireless spots such as businesses, universities, etc.) then you
may have connection problems that FORCE you to manually configure your IP
settings on the adapter. This is a FIX for XP SP2 that doesn't look like it
made it into Vista, so, if you are experiencing this problem, LIKE ME, then
you have no choice but to manually configure the IP settings.

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=822596

If you are having periodic connection problems (and you know they didn't
exist before), Vista has changed the Automitic IP Address discovery timing to
be almost instantaneous. So if you have an older wireless access point, or
one that has long broadcast / "handshake" times, then you may have trouble
because of this "improvement."

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/931550/en-us ; (MS Does not provide a
solution, only info. Like the other options, you will likely have to
MANUALLY set up your IP info in the adapter, or purchase a new wireless
access point.)

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929824/en-us ; (problems if you have the SAME
Gateway address as the one assigned to the computer you are trying to connect
to the Wireless spot).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To see your adapter info, use a command prompt window (Start > Run > type in
CMD) and then type:

ipconfig /all

Find your network adapter and write down the Gateway, DNS, IP Address, and
other settings.

Also, go to the EVENT VIEWER and see if there are any messages related to
you trying to connect to your wireless adapter at the times you tried to
connect.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Regardless of the problem, if you KNOW the wireless spot works, and you had
little or no trouble on XP, try MANUALLY setting up the IP info for that
wireless access point.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I'm VERY disappointed at how many problems there are with the Vista wireless
networking. Especially when SO MANY of the early Vista users are exactly the
same customer base that USES WIRELESS!

I recently purchased a new Gateway MT3418 Notebook with Vista Home Premium pre-installed. For a while I was really scratching my head as to why I could not make a wireless connection into my home network.

This network consists of a broadband (cable) modem, a Dlink DI-714P+ wireless router, and several computers. Some of the computers are running wirelessly and some are connected to the router with ethernet cable.

The Gateway notebook recognized the home network name (SSID), but I just could not make a condition, even when I entered the parameters manually.

Finally it dawned on me that maybe Microsoft had an update for my wireless card. So I connected up an ethernet cable to get a connection, went to Windows Update, and downloaded and installed all of the updates. Sure enough, one of the updates was for my wireless card, a Realtek 8185 Extensible 802.11g.

After doing the installs and restarting the computer, I disconnected the ethernet cable and still had a connection. Success!! Next time I'll install all updates BEFORE doing anything else!

I have the same problem, only mine did work, until a few days ago, i really need the laptop on collega and nobody knows what the problem is.
It only works when i plug in the cable.
I was wondering if you guys could help me out.
Maybe reinstall the driver for the wireless internet card?
I would try to install the latest Wireless driver first.

It is possible that you do not have a real valid connection to the Router,
and your Wireless seems OK but it is set to the 169.xxx.xxx.xxx default None
connection IP.
Try first to type the core IP of the Router to the Browser and see if you
get the Menus.