Question : IP issues with laptop on wireless network

I have a laptop which connects wirelessly through my Netgear router to reach the internet.  However, once in a while when trying to connect to my wireless network, it gets stuck at "Identifying... Access: Local Only"...and once in a while it connects and stays connected.  When it's stuck on the "Local Only" mode, I notice that its IP addess (when i do an ipconfig) is set to 169.254.170.70 which isn't a private IP.  And, the Default Gateway shows up as blank...

But, sometimes it connects just fine and gets a 192 IP along with the proper gateway IP.

I have my wireless router set to specify each connecting device with its own unique private IP, so I don't think its an IP conflict with any of my machines on my network.  When I check the TCP/IP settings on my faulty laptop it's the same as my others -- everything is set to be assigned automatically.  I don't notice any patterns of when it fails and when it works...  I'm not sure what else to do!

Thanks in advance!

Answer : IP issues with laptop on wireless network

As jrfaust mentioned, the autoconfig address indicates that your computer isn't able to find a network or acquire an IP address.  You mentioned that you've got other machines on the network...if those are using wireless successfully then we can probably safely say that it's this particular laptop. If so, then I would update the driver for the wireless adapter on that laptop as jrfaust suggested.   As he also suggested, it wouldn't hurt to update the firmware of your access point.  

If, on the other hand, the other computers are not connecting wirelessly, but are connecting successfully via wire (an ethernet cable) it would still either be an issue with your laptop's wireless adapter or the access point and the remedy would be the same: update the wireless adapter's driver and update the firmware on your access point.  This second scenario would simply draw more attention to the possibility that something's wrong with the wireless capability of the access point.  

Good luck!

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