PC hardware forum: "Network cable is disconnected" message

If it's not the PC's, the cards or the cables then that would leave the router/switch. Have you tried checking it or changing it out?

I had this problem all the time and it would drive me nuts!!!

I would always uninstall the drivers, most of the time, and then restart to let windows reinstall them by itself. If the issue still persists, try the drivers that were packaged with the motherboard, or download the latest driver version.

If nothing above fixes your issue, it could be several of the following:

There is a driver signing issue, conflicting with windows. (Do a fresh install)

Defect motherboard (have you touched anything inside of your PC lately?)

The router settings (Enter the main domain of your IP address in a web browser URL, and then look for a function that will reset everything to default)

fonfara's reply sounds the closest to the problem I am having which is similar to the original post, however, mine isn't a balloon that pops up, it's an actual icon in the space on the bottom right where the time and other icons are. It appears as dual computers with a red X through them and the message reads: Local Area Connection, A network cable is unplugged. The problem with that message is I don't have LAN. I have a single home PC on dial-up connection. It appeared about 3 months ago and all efforts to get rid of it have failed. I'd appreciatre any suggestions.

I tried your suggestion but it didn't work. When I went into LAN Properties, both were already unticked. Thanks anyway.

I had same problem. went into windows internet connection wisard and redone the connection .

I used to use IE but about a month or so ago, I switched to Firefox because I was having a lot of problems and it was when there was a major glitch found in IE. I had this problem before I switched though. Is there a way to do what you suggested through Firefox or do I have to go through IE? Thanks for your help.

thanks for the tip-will do that.

Ditto on the "2-wire" modem. It has an option that can be turned off; but until you do, it will intercept your web requests and deliver its own alerts instead no matter what URL you type. This has bad consequences for sites with pop-ups.

Another situation is when a worm or virus (or even a poorly constructed program) makes a "blocking call" and nothing else, not even Windows itself, can use the ethernet port until there's either a response or a timeout on the blocking call. I think newer versions of Windows (or updates to Windows) converts blocking calls to non-blocking calls to avoid this problem.

If it is a laptop computer, sometimes ethernet adapters will be turned off to save power; so if your batteries are a few years old you will experience this phenomenon more aggressively.

Dual speed switches/hubs can occasionally cause this problem. Cisco switches, for instance, include features to disable auto-negotiation to prevent problems that sometimes result when the PC is dancing around with a switch; each of them trying to adapt to the other. You can disable auto negotiation in the PC too by editing the adapter settings in the Device Manager of "My Computer". Really it would be "Your Computer" since mine works well enough

My laptop, however, was very aggressive about disabling the ethernet interface and turning it off over the slightest glitch. That's a feature that can be disabled (which I did, since I use it for network troubleshooting and don't need an ethernet interface that turns itself off).