Helping Clients Get Online – Checklist

Remote support saves time and effort but what if your user can’t get online? This simple troubleshooting checklist helps you get connected. It might be useful even for experienced technicians, especially at the end of a long business day.

Before taking steps to solve the issue it is good to know what is happening. Ask user:

• What's on the screen?
• Any error messages, strange behavior?
• When did the problem emerge or how long does it exist?

Checking power supply

Check:

• If actually there's electricity on the premises. User can be working on a laptop off a battery while the premises are blacked out.
• If everything okay with power supply units (strange noise, smell, smoke, etc.).
• If ISP's equipment is powered. There might be a blackout in the neighborhood.

Checking network connectivity

Check:

• Cable connections – should be properly plugged in.
• Check cables for possible tears, squeezes (especially by doors, etc.). It would be fine to test with a spare cable, if possible. Could detach it from a networked printer, etc.
• Maybe a thick wall or big distance disrupt wireless connection. User might have moved their laptop to another location – and lose access.
• If just a specific web site is not working, then the problem could be just with that website.
• Ask the user to ping 8.8.8.8 (Google DNS servers) and/or nslookup google.com.

Checking networking devices

Though the physical connections look OK, the problem might still lie in networking hardware: router, access point, network adapters (wired or wireless). Check:

• Power LEDs.
• WAN and LAN LEDs.
• If the Wi-Fi is antenna properly attached (kids or pets sometimes do funny things).

Still, if the LEDs are blinking and look fine:

• Reboot the device.
• Detach and reattach the cables.
• Disconnect and reconnect Wi-Fi connection.
• Switch from wired to wireless connection or vice versa (if possible).

Checking operating system/software problems and further diagnostics

Here the checklist is pretty simple as well:

• Try another web browser.
• Disable Firewall.
• Disable Antivirus.
• Check device manager to ensure network devices are properly identified.
• Check device manager for hardware conflicts with network devices.
• Check if power save modes for network adapters are disabled.
• Run ipconfig /all.
• Check the hosts file for incorrect or malicious entries.

Actions that can be taken:

• Reboot.
• Reboot into safe mode with networking, see if there’s Internet connectivity.
• Re-install network device drivers.
• Run ipconfig /release.
• Run ipconfig /renew.
• Run ipconfig /flushdns.

Third-party software problems

We’ve checked browser, firewall and antivirus. If some traffic monitoring software like GlassWire is installed, it’s a good idea to check:

• Main traffic consumers.