BT Home Hub About As Much use As A Chocloate Teapot...

[macman81]

I'm trying to set up a BT Home Hub 1.5 for a friend. BT charged him £50 to 'install' it (i.e. to take it out of the box and plug it in). They got it connected to the net on the 'engineer's' laptop using the wireless link,, but couldn't get an internet connection via the network cable to the desktop PC. The engineer then said that, as he had demonstrated a connection at the hub, he had done his job-and left! (Apparently he was there less than 30 mins). Later after my friend complained by phone they advised him to 'reinstall Windows'...doh).
The PC is running XP Media Edition, SP2 installed, has up to date antivirus and anti-spyware (McAfee and Spyware Doctor).
I have checked the connection to the Hub using my own laptop, both wired and wirelessly, and it's fine. That rules out a faulty ethernet port on the Hub or a faulty ethernet cable. I have looked into the Hub config (which strangely enough I can access via the ethernet cable from the PC) and all appears OK (other than that the BT numpty had set the wireless connection up using WEP...). The Hub diagnostics say all is fine and it can 'see' the PC, did ping test router to PC, all OK.
So the Hub seems OK, and so do the connections.
Turning to the PC hardware, I checked the network card in Device Manager and it indicates no problem, tried reinstalling the driver anyway, made no difference. The yellow light on the ethernet port is lit-all OK.
OK, so it must be the PC software. I checked in Network Connections, the IP address range is correct, the default gateway matches the router. IP and DNS addresses set to obtain automatically. Anyway I cleared all these and rebooted, all reobtained OK and appear correct. Then I pinged the hub, all OK there too.
Firewall maybe? Windows firewall is switched off, using McAfee one. I switched this off temporarily, still no joy.
Browser problem (Internet Explorer)? I tried using Firefox-no connection either.
Can anyone please suggest what else I might check, as I'm completely out of ideas having struggled with this for hours.
We even tried the Home Hub 'helpdesk' (not much help): once they had established that the Hub was installed and apparently working, they refused to assist further unless we paid for an enhanced tech support service...

 

[TonyWarrington]

......Firewall maybe? Windows firewall is switched off, using McAfee one. I switched this off temporarily, still no joy.

Are you sure you actually fully switch off McAfee not just disabled it for one session? Have you tried turning off all non essentials using msconfig then testing again?
EDIT: Or perhaps start Windows in Safe Mode with Networking and give it a try

 

[macman81]

Thank you, I finally managed to get Windows Update to run and applying SP3 resolved the problem immediately, though I am not sure exactly what it was. But it was not related to the Firewall settings.

 

[Igorian]

Try running the Network Setup Wizard.

Edit.

Ok, cool it's fixed.

 

[Trazor]

BT Home Hub About As Much use As A Chocloate Teapot...

I presume you will be offering BT a suitable apology.........

 

[macman81]

Er, no. While I accept that they're not responsible for the customer's PC settings, the fact that they 1) failed to set up his wireless security properly, 2) changed the router password and failed to write it down for him, 3) didn't set up his bt email account as promised, 4) were in and out the door in half an hour when their website indicates they will typically spend 2 hours setting up...basically I think this home service is a con for £58.75. The Home Hub is supposed to work out of the box, all they are actually doing is just taking it out of the box and plugging it in. The least they could have done was spend another 30 mins trying to make it work for him.