Win 8.1 Lenovo laptop can not connect to wifi hotspots

Hi,

I'm having a problem where my laptop will not connect to any wifi hotspots. I can connect to my home network and the network at my mom's place, but when I go to say McDonald's where there's free wifi, my computer will see the network and say "limited" when I try to connect. It hangs forever in that state.

I brought a second laptop (also a Lenovo, on Win 7) to the McD's and it connected right away with no problem. My phone (Blue Studio Energy/KitKat) also connected right away.

Something is wrong on this laptop where I just can't connect at the library or restaurant etc. I tried the ipconfig/release renew thing and I always get an error after I try to renew:

No operation can be performed on Bluetooth Network Connection while it has its media disconnected.
No operation can be performed on Local Area Connection* 2 while it has its media disconnected.
No operation can be performed on Ethernet while it has its media disconnected.
An error occurred while renewing interface Wi-Fi : The operation was canceled by the user.

No idea what that means.

Any ideas on what's wrong? Thank you.

Your going to need to give way more info than that man..

first of all.. see what programs/firewall differences you have between the one that does connect and the one that doesn't..

what firewall settings do you have? have you changed anything since the default setup windows 8.1 ?

Also sometimes in pubic places when there are way too many people connected to 1 router on Mcdonalds, you will get a "limited" connection..

sometimes public routers only allow 10-20 people online at 1 time.. so could be that too..

If it is stating Limited when connecting to Public hotspots, that can be due to a Internet Security Software that is causing it not to connect. Most public hotspots will only state limited, until you open up the Web browser and agree to the Terms.

Your only concern is with Wifi. Forget about the other devices.

brooksndun said:

Your going to need to give way more info than that man..

first of all.. see what programs/firewall differences you have between the one that does connect and the one that doesn't..

what firewall settings do you have? have you changed anything since the default setup windows 8.1 ?

Also sometimes in pubic places when there are way too many people connected to 1 router on Mcdonalds, you will get a "limited" connection..

sometimes public routers only allow 10-20 people online at 1 time.. so could be that too..

Click to expand...

Not with the ATT hotspots. But there are times you run into third party Internet Security software being the culprit.

Yeah I agree.. I did forget about public wifi sometimes you need to put in a login and "accept" or check/tick boxes to be able to go online when You open up your web browser... most definitely could be that.. but if he gets on with his phone and other devices, I guess he knows how to do that..

Hi,

(I am a woman, btw...)

I will check the settings on my security...

McD's does open a page where you need to click to accept their terms, but my computer never got to that page at all. When I was at the McD's there was one guy in the whole place on a computer as it was raining out and pretty empty so I'm not sure it was a high demand sort of thing. I dragged my second laptop all the way back there (my internet at home went out due to the storm and I had a deadline) and it gave me the terms page instantly and I was online just fine. I will check the Webroot settings though. Thanks for your replies, I'll update with news after checking the settings.

A lot of computers will do that, when you connect. I would flush all history, etc for the web browser. Download Speccy at piriform.com/speccy

A lot of us do not believe in using third party Internet Security software, because it causes too many headaches. That is why we tend to just stick to using Windows Firewall and have it set to only be enabled when on Public Hotspots.

I bet if you disable Webroot. The problems will be solved. The other question is, does the other laptop you have also have Webroot installed, or something else.