client loses ip address and needs reboot

[PCvrach]

Xp user on cable Broadband loses his ip address and needs reboot to refresh. What would cause this? Has worked fine in the past and has only done this in the last few days.
Any ideas what I should be looking for?
Thanks

 

[Grenage]

Are you sure that 'loss of IP address' is the cause of the problem? I would have thought the connection could be re-established immediately afterwards rather than needing to restart the machine, if this was the case.

Which modem are they using?

I recently had this problem with an Alcatel modem, the cure was eventually fresh drivers.

 

[PCvrach]

The client is using a network card type modem rather than an external USB. He has installed new drivers yesterday which worked, but today lost the ip address and needed to reboot. The pc is normally running all the time without requiring this. I wonder if it is some software causing this?
Baffled!

 

[Grenage]

It does sound feasible.

Has the client tried typing "ipconfig /renew" into a command prompt rather than rebooting the machine?

If that doesn't work, I would start looking at the software.

 

[PCvrach]

Any idea which software to check, reinstalling drivers was only a temporary fix. Have sent him away to do virus and spyware scan.
Thanks for your help.

 

[Grenage]

You mentioned that the client was using XP, if the problem has only been occuring for a few days do you think it might be possible for them to use the System Restore feature?

Might possibly rectify something that the user has done, assuming the problem is software-based.