Snow Leopard networking startup problem

H

Hippo Man

Hippo Man
I recently upgraded from Leopard (10.5.8) to Snow Leopard (10.6.1), and while most things are working fine, I'm now experiencing a networking problem that wasn't present under Leopard.

Under Snow Leopard, when my machine starts up, networking seems to only be partially initialized. Networking is shown as being up, but I can't access any outside sites through any kind of TCP connection. I can't ping anything either via domain name or IP address, and there is no DNS.

I can fix this by issuing the following two commands in a Terminal window:

sudo ifconfig en0 down
sudo ifconfig en0 up​

After running these commands, my network restarts properly, and I can then access internet sites with no problem.

Here are some more pertinent facts:

* This problem started occurring exactly at the time I upgraded to Snow Leopard. It never happened under Leopard.

* This is with an ethernet connection to my DSL router. No Airport or any other kind of networking is present.

* If I unplug my ethernet cable, wait 5 seconds, and re-plug it in, my network restarts and then works properly, without the need for the ifconfig commands that I mentioned above.

* I have another computer on my local network which is connected to the same DSL router. This computer is not running MacOS, and I can access the internet just fine via that computer, even when my Mac's network connection is not working.

* I didn't change anything with my router or any of my other hardware. The only change that was made was my upgrade from Leopard to Snow Leopard.

I know how to work around this problem (I just created a startup script with those two ifconfig commands in it). However, I'm looking for a bona fide solution if there is one, not just a hacky workaround.

Thanks in advance for any ideas or suggestions.
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Some people believe there is a bug in Snow Leopard's DNS settings. try some of these fixes:

1. Navigate to System Preferences->Network and at the top of the pane select a New "Location" and when you do this hit the button "apply" to activate the new location.

2. Make Snow Leopard is in the right time zone in System Preferences->Date & Time.


3. In System Preferences->Network click on the little Gear icon (near the bottom of the pane) and make sure you primary connection is at the top of the left hand pane.

4. Use OpenDNS to see if that helps.


Then there is a nuke possible fix and it requires certain steps or you will really screw up things.

1. You MUST disconnect and shut down all possible Airport connections and turn you Macs Airport card OFF!

2. As an Administrator of the Mac navigate to the folder /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/ and delete the files com.apple.airport.preferences.plist, NetworkInterfaces.plist, preferences.plist & com.apple.nat.plist and then you MUST RESTART!! Then setup you networking again as from scratch.

If none of these options fix the problem then you must NUKE you drive and reinstall Snow Leopard and re-import all you applications, pictures,music, etc.

Good Luck.
 
Thanks for your tips. I had already performed the "nuke possible fix" you mentioned, but I must have not done it correctly the first time, because I did it again, and this time, I got my network working.

So thank you!

I forgot to mention that I'm using static IP with my machine, so OpenDNS isn't an option for me. But luckily, now that things are working, I don't need it.

I very much appreciate your help.
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