Hi Rob, and thanks for your suggestions.

Apologies for the slow response; as per my reply to MrS, I was out of the loop yesterday, but I am trying a new network cable as that was a very easy check to perform. I've already seen a couple of disconnects, so that's not looking promising but I'll keep monitoring for the time being.

I did check the drivers before my original post, but I will take a look at the Dell forums to see if any one else is having problems - something I should have thought of sooner. I'll also check out the possibility of replacing/ updating the network card, but not until I've checked out the fixwd IP option.

I'll update in due course

In reply to a post by Mygri:

I have already unchecked the power setting 'allow system to turn off network adaptor'

Try re-enabling this.

Hi,

I've re-enabled, but as I've run out of time, I'll have to check the outcome in tomorrow. I'll advise in due course. Thanks for the suggestion.

Hi Rob,

I've been running the new cable today, no joy, still getting interruptions. I'll try static IP tomorrow and advise the outcome.

Cheers, Mike

I've re-enabled, but as I've run out of time, I'll have to check the outcome in tomorrow. I'll advise in due course. Thanks for the suggestion.

No change, so on to other avenues. Thanks again

Status so far:
The new network cable has shown the same behaviour as the old one, so no gain there.
After looking around the Dell Forums, I did find what may be a more recent driver, although not sure it's strictly applicable to this nic. I decided to give it a roll, and it's installed alright, but is still showing interrupts. I think it may also have reset the audio drivers, as I'm getting no sound at the moment. I'll run it from a cold start on Monday, but unless things improve I will roll back to the official Dell version.
So after that, it will be trying fixed IP address.

I'll update in due course.

Cheers
Mike

Update,

NIC interrupts are still occurring after:
- Replacement network cable,
- Later driver (although not entirely sure of its applicability, it did not appear to affect network function), now rolled back,
- Fixed IP.

So I'm left with the conclusion that it's a faulty nic, and I either live with it using wireless, which I don't like for day to day usage, or find a viable replacement.

Thanks for your suggestions and comments which are much appreciated.

Edited by Mygri (Mon 10-Feb-14 17:55:25)

Hi Rob,

I've just posted a reply to MrS with the latest situation, namely that I seem to have exhausted all the options with no positive outcome, so I'm relectantly forced to the conclusion that it's a faulty nic

Thanks for your comments and suggestions- much appreciated

Mike

It still could be many things if you really would rather use the built in interface, it takes two ends to make a connection after all.

As one step (no need to try each individually), make sure your router firmware is up to date, swap the cable to a different router port, in the realtek driver settings set the speed and duplex manually rather than auto, and disable your security suite firewall and enable windows firewall.

If this doesn't work you can try a different spare router or configure the spare as a switch inserted between the computer and router (connect it to PC, give it a static IP outside the netgears address range then disable it's DHCP server)

You can contact Dell and/or Netgear to see what they can offer, it's not acceptable for an essential feature not to work. Or USB ethernet interfaces work just fine and 100Mb are cheap as chips.

It's refreshing to see someone update their progress and be so polite, I hope you get it fixed.

Hello again,

Thanks for your further suggestions and kind words - much appciated!

I'll follow up your suggestions and report back. In the meantime, I've got my ISP to put me back and a 6dB profile, and I'm now syncing at 10.7Mb/s, which is nice.

In fact I've already looked at the router firmware, and I did find one later version, but it appears to be for US settings. I might try it nonetheless.

Watch this space...