Question : Internet availability at random under specific circumstances

I have a very odd problem with my laptop. It's a Dell Vostro 1400 with a Dual Core and 4 GB or RAM. I run Vista Business on it and use IE8 to browse the net. It is connected to our workplace domain since a couple of months back.

While at work, my internet connection works problem free, but it has started acting very oddly the past weeks at home. At home I have a broadband connection (100/10) distributed by a NetGear WGR614, and I connect using wireless.

The symptoms that started a couple of weeks ago, is that my browser can't find the page I'm asking for, any page at all. It says the usual about diagnosing my connection. This however, happens on and off. If I just wait for a while, I can surf normally again. All the while, my "Connected to" icon down by the clock, says I'm constantly connected.

But an even odder thing is that while the access is down, I can still surf domains I entered before it went down, as well as continue to stream video. So if I'm on say espn.com, I can surf around as long as I don't leave that domain or try entering a different one.

I thought it might be Firewall/AV based so I first discarded my Symantec Small Business Protection and instead turned to Trend Micro. But even without any firewall or AV at all, it was still the same.

I thought it might be router to internet problem, but I couldn't connect to the router while I was down, so my conclusion was it was probably local. Plus my girlfriend can surf wireless on her laptop using the same router.

I then thought it might be browser based so I installed Google Chrome. It worked fine for a couple of minutes but then it got connection problems too. So it doesn't seem to be browser based.

A longshot info is that I tried to connect to my workplace server via VPN for the first time about a month ago. The internet connection and internet availability then swayed a bit as well, but always evened out as the connection matured. There is no direct pattern, but the problem I have have escalated over time (less and less availability), so if it was planted there it could have followed a nice natural growing pattern. Longshot as I said.

Any ideas?

Answer : Internet availability at random under specific circumstances

> But an even odder thing is that while the access is down, I can still surf domains I entered before it went down, as well as continue to stream video. So if I'm on say espn.com, I can surf around as long as I don't leave that domain or try entering a different one.

That seems to indicate a DNS problem.

At home, what DNS server are you using? Try to manually configure your DNS server to one of the OpenDNS servers 208.67.222.222 and see if the problems still occur.