After establishing a Win7 home network for two PCs I have an unknown, named, third PC appears as part of the workgroup. I have tried changing the network from home to business and back and the other PC still appears each time. I tried changing the name of the workgroup as well. When attempting to connect to this intruder, it is always "unavailable". This is a wired network. How can I force this PC to be deleted from the network?

Even if YOUR computers are wired, unless you have disabled the wireless radio in a router, by default it is open with no security and anyone can connect. Either login and turn off the wireless if you are not using it OR immediately establish WPA2-AES security for your wireless router. Make sure you protect that login to your router with a strong password. Power cycle the router. On Mon, 23 Aug 2010 04:22:48 +0000, dave0462 wrote: > > >After establishing a Win7 home network for two PCs I have an unknown, named, third PC appears as part of the workgroup. > >I have tried changing the network from home to business and back and the other PC still appears each time. I tried changing the name of the workgroup as well. When attempting to connect to this intruder, it is always "unavailable". > >This is a wired network. > >How can I force this PC to be deleted from the network? Barb Bowman http://www.digitalmediaphile.com

Barb, Thank you for your response. However, the router I am using is not wireless capable - it is an older CAT5 10/100 router. I had considered changing the DHCP scope so that it would only supply fixed IPs to my three home networked computers and not accept new requests, however, I have unfortunately forgotten the password in the mists of time. When I ping this computer, I get an IP which is completely out of scope for my home network. I use the typical 192.168 scope. This computer name resolves to 5.185.185.54 and always seems to time out. A whois check says the address is reserved to IANA. A RBL/DNSBL check for this IP lists a load of blacklisted malware/spamer sites, most of which seem to be inactive. So I urgently want this computer off my network! Is there any way to clear all caches or the registry of all network info and create a new one from scratch? This is Win7 pro.

what router do you have exactly? what is the name of this strange computer? if you disconnect the router from your broadband modem and keep the router turned on and reboot the computers, does this still show up? please post the text results of ipconfig /all here as a reply On Tue, 24 Aug 2010 20:22:53 +0000, dave0462 wrote: > > >Barb, > >Thank you for your response. However, the router I am using is not wireless capable - it is an older CAT5 10/100 router. I had considered changing the DHCP scope so that it would only supply fixed IPs to my three home networked computers and not accept new requests, however, I have unfortunately forgotten the password in the mists of time. > >When I ping this computer, I get an IP which is completely out of scope for my home network. I use the typical 192.168 scope. This computer name resolves to 5.185.185.54 and always seems to time out. > >A whois check says the address is reserved to IANA. A RBL/DNSBL check for this IP lists a load of blacklisted malware/spamer sites, most of which seem to be inactive. > >So I urgently want this computer off my network! Is there any way to clear all caches or the registry of all network info and create a new one from scratch? > >This is Win7 pro. Barb Bowman http://www.digitalmediaphile.com

Hi, I would like to confirm your network environment first: - How many computers are there in this network. - Is there any wireless or Bluetooth devices connected? BTW, You can try to uninstall your network adapter driver in Device Manager, and reinstall it. Try this and see what’s the result. Regards, Alex zhaozx

Barb, You may have hit on something here! When I did the ipconfig/all, I noticed that I had a connection to a remote network called Hamachi. This is supposed to be a remote network for gaming and had been installed some months ago at the suggestion of one of my sons who wanted to play a remote game with me while he's at school. I was under the impression that I had set it to manual and that the connection would not be active unless I logged on. Yet, the ipconfig showed an active, recently renewed lease to a Class A IP address in the 5. range. I blew this program out of my machine (and made sure it was gone in the registry) and did another ipconfig: lo and behold, the phantom computer was gone as well, without a reboot. I hadn't used this basic tool initially simply because I'm so rusty, having been out of the network world for some years now. So I'm embarrassed. I will conduct the other tests you suggested. Forgive me for not posting the results of the ipconfig/all as I'd rather not put out all that data in a public site. BTW, the computer's name was "IVY". Dave

Alex, Thank you for responding. I may be in the process of resolving this issue, but if not, I'll let you know. To answer your questions, there are no wireless connections of any type, including bluetooth and I had already played with the adapter as you mention. Dave

there is some malware that masquerades as Hamachi. do a Google search. if blowing the program away has cleared the issue while you are connected, then you are probably ok. if you are behind a NAT, there isn't much to worry about posting an posting ipconfig /all People do it here all the time. On Sat, 28 Aug 2010 00:31:59 +0000, dave0462 wrote: > > >Barb, > >You may have hit on something here! When I did the ipconfig/all, I noticed that I had a connection to a remote network called Hamachi. This is supposed to be a remote network for gaming and had been installed some months ago at the suggestion of one of my sons who wanted to play a remote game with me while he's at school. > >I was under the impression that I had set it to manual and that the connection would not be active unless I logged on. Yet, the ipconfig showed an active, recently renewed lease to a Class A IP address in the 5. range. > >I blew this program out of my machine (and made sure it was gone in the registry) and did another ipconfig: lo and behold, the phantom computer was gone as well, without a reboot. > >I hadn't used this basic tool initially simply because I'm so rusty, having been out of the network world for some years now. So I'm embarrassed. > >I will conduct the other tests you suggested. Forgive me for not posting the results of the ipconfig/all as I'd rather not put out all that data in a public site. > >BTW, the computer's name was "IVY". > >Dave Barb Bowman http://www.digitalmediaphile.com