I have been trying to solve a problem with my computer hanging for about 60 seconds in the middle of loading programs while apparently the DHCP server searches for an IP address.
Well, I was following advice on another tech forum to try manually assigning an IP address to the NIC card. They said I have IPCP not DHCP, and told me to put in a certain IP address and Default Gateway.
It seemed to help…… After I restarted, there was no delay on startup, but when I started my dial-up broadband connection I got an error message–something about a configuration problem. BUT–I connected! OK, not bad, I thought–no more delay, and maybe this error message will go away.
Curious to try this again, I restarted the computer to see what would happen and…. Computer just hangs and hangs and hangs on the initial screen that shows the motherboard logo. I tried many times to restart over the last 2 days. Sometimes, after about 5 to 10 minutes, it will get past the screen, and show the startup menu. Twice I chose “Startup from last known good configuration.” It will start to load up Windows XP, and then just go to a blank dark screen with a faint pink glow and die there. One other time I chose Safe Mode and it seemed to load up drivers until the screen was full and then just hang there forever.
But usually I cant even get past the initial screen. All this from configuring my NIC card? Or is there some hardware malfunction that just happened at the same time totally coincidentally???
By the way————
I have a SpeedStream 5100 DSL Modem. If it is helpful, there is info on this modem here: http://www.efficient.com/subscriber_networks/5100.shtml
While trying to get the computer to start up I did try unplugging modem from the NIC card. It did not seem to make any difference.