I have an ADSL Gateway Linksys BEFDSR41W and am unable to access the settings screen, I have checked that the modem is turned on and the indicator lights are Ok. It seemed to happen when my pc reported a problem with the network and the settings had changed. If I switch the router on or off the system recognises a change in the network but the system will no longer automatically issue ip adress's, I have to set them manually.I have rebooted the router and both pc's but without success
Have you any suggestions as to what the problem may be?

Normally your router should dispense IP-addresses, not your PC.
Disconnect all others from the router except your main PC. Use a CAT5 straight cable from PC to router.
Write down your network settings, then change them as needed:
In your network settings, enter 192.168.1.100 as your own IP, 255.255.255.0 as subnet
Enter the router's IP as the gateway IP
Enter the router's IP as the first DNS server
Save the settings
In your browser's address bar, type in the IP of the router, eg http://192.168.1.254
that should get you into the router's setup

If that router access IP for the browser doesn't work try this one http://192.168.1.1/

and isn't the router base address 192.168.1.0 ? I have the BERSR41, not a wireless so my info may be useless.

No device can have an IP address ending with a 0.

Most routers come set default to 192.168.0.1 Usually they are set to act as a DHCP server on the private side and always as a dhcp client on the public side.

It sounds like something got accidentally changed. Assuming you're not running a VPN I'd suggest you grab a paperclip, press and hold the reset button on the back until the red Diag LED on the front turns on and off completely. This will reset the factory defaults. Double check your TCP/IP settings on your PC too. Windows updates have been known to force changes network protocol settings. Also if you are running any "firewall software", make sure nothing has changed there. I once upon a time was bouncing off the ceiling because I lost connectivity. My anti-virus software had gone into emergency lock because it got all confused which in a worst case senario, is the best thing it could do.

RBS - I tried that but it just throws up the message " cannot access this page offline" and wants to connect to the internet. The actual router address is 192.168.1.1 as Tarkus mentioned.
TBA - I tried the paperclip trick but it made no difference.
Its almost as though the router does not want to talk to the other computers, at the moment only mine is connected, although it registers their presence.
I have switched off my firewall incase this may have been the cause but again it made no difference.

Check your cable. Just because you get a link light doesn't necessarily mean you've got a good signal. From a command prompt ping your machine. Yes physically ping the address you are working from. If you cannot ping yourself, your nic is either dead or misconfigured. If you can ping yourself, ping your router. If you can ping your router, telnet to it and check it's configs. If port 80 is switched off, you wont be able to surf. If port 23 is switched off, you won't be able to telnet to it.

Routers seldom go bad. I suspect 1st a bad cable, 2nd a bad nic, 3rd a misconfigured nic since you said you did a factory default reset and you're seeing activity lights on the outside.



oh oh oh, if you can ping the router, try pinging an address on the outside such as cisco dot com which is 198.133.219.25 there is always the chance that you've lost touch with yer diesel provider. Another thing to try is to physically bypass your router. If you get connectivity, then it's time to replace your router.

TBA you were right, I tried again to reset the router but this time I held the button in for a few seconds and this time it seemed to work. PC and router now seem to be talking to each other again.
I still can't set it up to connect to the internet over the network, although I suspect that is more to do with AOL and the settings I have tried. I guess I will just have to persevere, unless anyone has any suggestions.

Well I finally got my router to work with AOL on one of my machines, it was finally a problem with my username. One problem I seem to be having though is that I cannot access some web sites, MSN in particular, I also cannot log on with MSN messenger.
Any suggestions?

The other problem I have encountered is that my other pc will not log onto AOL and even cannot go into the settings on the router, although it will happily connect to the other machine and print ok over the network.
The only difference between the 2 is that my second pc is connected to the router with a crossover cable, would this make a difference?

If I can crack this I shall be a happy chappie :grinthumb

Log on to AOL meaning what?
Cannot access some websites meaning what?
Home routers don't care about crossover/straight cables.

AOL is installed on both machines and I should be able to access the internet by connecting to AOL on either, I cannot do this on the one machine. Accessing the router setup program is also not possible from this machine.
I thought the crossover cable should not cause the provblem but was just thinking of differences between the two.
The problem with websites seems to be random in nature. although I cannot access them through IE, if I put the URL into the AOL browser it opens the page without a problem. I wondered if it may be a firewall problem but I still cannot access sites even with them turned off. Sometimes I can access the home page but cannot drill down to the information I want from the site.
Connecting to MSN messenger is not possible either.
I was able to access all of them with my old USB Broadband modem.

contrary to popular belief, you need straight network cables between PC and router.
Crossover is only for connecting 2 PCs directly.

All home routers are able to tell between a crossover and a straight cable and will switch signals accordingly. The ignorance of consumers is more powerful than networking dogmas.

High end networking gear still refuses to work with both types cables though

Netgear Router/AOL and Msn Fix

In the router setup under WAN change the MTU setting to 1400
it fixes all the problems like no connection to MSN or any microsoft web pages..
cheers Ricky