Windows 7 VPN disconnects

[WHD]

Hello all: I recently reformatted my hard drive and installed Windows 7…which seems to be working fine. At the same time my work upgraded their Outlook exchange server. I have been given instructions to set up a VPN to access the exchange server. I set up the VPN as directed and was able to make the connection to the Server. The problem is that once the VPN connects it automatically drops the internet connection and thus the connection to the VPN as well. I initially thought it may have something to do with my router and its ability to handle a VPN…so I got a new one (Linksys wrt54g2) but I still have the same problem. Any help would be greatly appreciated, my main goal is simply to receive my e-mail on my home computer on my outlook with all other accounts.
Thanks,
BD

 

[eibgrad]

What I suggest is temporarily connect your PC directly to the modem and try again (i.e. NO ROUTER). Of course, you may have to deal w/ a local firewall, but presumably the VPN client will take care of that for you (at least if you’re using the Windows firewall, which you should for this experiment). If it works just fine, at least you know it's a problem related to the router. VPNs and NAT routers often have problems, so nothing would surprise me.

 

[WHD]

Thanks for your quick response:
After a bit of effort I was able to bypass the router and connect directly through my modem. But, to no avail. My internet connection was sill dropped once my VPN connected. Any other thoughts? I see on line that I may not be the only one with this issue in windows 7, but have not been able to find a fix yet.

 

[eibgrad]

My approach with these types of problems is to continue trying to find ways to narrow down the culprit. So far we've confirmed it's not the router. That's a big plus. But as far as I know, this is the only VPN server you've attempted to connect to. So if possible, I would try to find another one and see if the problem is only THAT VPN server, or ANY VPN server. The former would suggest a misconfiguration on either your VPN server or more likely, VPN client. That's not to say finding another VPN server is easy, it's not like ppl have them routinely up and available for public use. But they do exist, perhaps from an online VPN service. Of course, you’d want to be sure they supported the MS VPN client and didn’t require their own.

In a similar vein, I would try Windows XP or Vista, perhaps in a VM, just to see if I could determine if it’s Windows 7 specific.

Whittle it down, step by step, until you can narrow the possibilities as much as possible. Otherwise, it could prove very hard to solve. Debugging VPNs is no picnic. There little you can really do, it tends to either work or it doesn’t. And if indeed there’s some bizarre VPN bug in Windows 7, you might just be better off using another OS (even a VM) for the time being until you can get past it. Frankly, a VM isn’t a bad solution anyway. It’s a great way to segregate your personal life from your work life when you need to deal w/ each on a daily basis. Some VPNs will tunnel ALL your internet traffic, even for personal use. By using a VM, you can avoid that.

 

[WHD]

Thanks for your help again. I will give that a shot a bit later tonight. I will try to track down a VPN.

 

[DandSG]

Hello, I'm a novice home user who is trying to help my spouse use her new work laptop. Windows 7, using Windows VPN. We have always been able to connect via VPN before on other laptops (XP). Now this new machine does not hold internet connection. Same issue as you originally noted. What was the solution? Thanks

 

[Gorosh]

Hello,
Go to your VPN connection's Properties.

Networking (tab) -> select 'Internet Protocol' from the list and click 'Properties' -> click 'Advanced...' -> uncheck 'Use default gateway on remote network'

This should solve problem.

 

[The_Prophecy]

This topic has been closed by The_Prophecy