Windows 10: Network Protocols

You saved the day (and the rest of what little hair I had left). I tried about 10 different fixes and nothing was working. THIS was the solution... after 3 hours of wasted time! Thank you so much!!

 

I had the issue of protocol not installed on Wind 10, strangely after I replace the rented TW modem with Aris that had wireless integrated - later i replaced this with just a basic cable modem. I did get intermittent internet, this lasted several weeks.

I have Dell Inspiron notebook.

The solution that worked for my case, proposed by a friend for network adapter - Intel(R) Centrino(R) Wireless-N 2230 - was to down load from the Dell site the related drivers for this adapter.

I then completely uninstalled the adapter and using the downloaded driver, reinstalled the adapter. For past week, it is working flawlessly.

In between, I tried Intel Driver Update Utility 2.0 - that has the same driver - this did not work consistently. You have to install from ur computer manufacturer.

Hope this helps.

 

Out of curiosity, what driver version did the driver update utility return with? It's extremely odd you received an issue with the intel provided drivers, as even though they are "generic", meaning they haven't been customized by the OEM for a specific model of PC, intel supplied drivers are recommended over OEM versions 99.99% of the time due to the fragmentation that occurs when utilizing OEM supplied drivers.

• OEMs do not release regular updates, especially when it comes to network cards, and is the main reason why the component manufacturer's drivers are almost always recommended (applicable specifically to network drivers, as other OEM supplied drivers, such as graphics drivers, have caveats)
• Intel is easily one of the best, if not the best, component manufacturer when it comes to staying on top of driver updates and supporting their products for substantially longer than OEMs. Intel generally releases a driver update about once a month for their WiFi cards to fix bugs that have popped up here and there.
• OEMs only support a PC for a short period of time, usually around 24 months... something Dell is notorious for doing, even on their Alienware line. Once your PC's model passes the 24 month mark (not the age of your PC, but 24 months following the factory produced model), you're on borrowed time as it's likely if the OEM hasn't already stopped actively supporting your model, they will fairly shortly.
  • "Actively supporting" refers not to tech support, but to whether the OEM is still releasing driver and BIOS/UEFI firmware updates for that specific model.

A quick FYI:It is never recommended to utilize a modem/router combo as they never work properly and are more of a headache than they're worth.

It's also never recommended to utilize a router given to you by your ISP, as you forfeit your privacy.
Utilizing an ISP owned router allows them a backdoor into your local [home] network, which is there for the sole purpose of making it easier on the consumer to troubleshoot network issues. However, the problem arises with the fact that backdoor can be accessed at any time and without your permission.
Do I believe there's a conspiracy by ISPs to invade your privacy, no; however, in this day and age, with network breaches left and right on corporations housing your most sensitive data (bank accounts, CC#'s, SSN's, etc.), is it really that far fetched to believe an ISP that provides a backdoor into their customer's home networks isn't a target for hackers?
Also, I, nor you, or anyone else, knows what kind of screening and background checks, if any, are done by ISPs for employees having access to the router's backdoor. You have no idea who they are, and thus, much like you would never give a stranger on the street a key to your house, you should never give the key to your network to a faceless voice on a phone to whom you do not know.
Considering everyone houses sensitive information on their home PCs, whether it be bank statements, personal photos, research, etc., it's unwise to allow any third party unfettered remote access into your home network.

 

After trying many things I simply deleted two updates and now all is fine... Enjoy!

 

What two updates?

 

I have been reading this thread with interest, and seem to have found a solution for myself. I restored to Windows 8.1 and then re-installed all of my programs. It seemed to be working well for about a day and then reverted to "network protocols are missing". So I did it again, and re-installed everything except Cyber Ghost and Open VPN. It's been two days now and everything is working fine. However, this is kind of an unsatisfactory solution for me, because I need Open VPN for work. Is there some configuration change I can make to get this working?

 

Had the same error which occurred after trying PIA's killswitch. I turned off the killswitch in settings, saved and switched off the pc. Upon starting the next day I got the error "one or more network protocols are missing on this computer". Tried various fixes, restarts etc with no joy and finally found the problem. I realize this applies only to this particular situation but maybe someone else will find it useful.

I had to undertake the following incredibly complicated procedure:
Find the PIA icon in the tray
Click it
Hit exit
Wait approximately .5 seconds
Done

Facedesk. Had to look in a mirror to see the problem. Really no idea how I missed this my own stupid fault I guess... At least I know the killswitch works!

 

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Dell Inspiron 11 with Windows 10, starting having the wifi connectivity problems, all other PCs were fine, so it was not the router. After making the change on the NetBIOS over TCP/IP and restarting, wifi was back again.

Thank you!*Smile

 

Are you actually having issues in connectivity and seeing the network protocols error, or are you seeing the protocol error, but not seeing connectivity issues?

If you're actually seeing connectivity issues, I would install OpenVPN's latest update 2.3.10 and see if the connectivity issues come back. If they do, I would google how to create a TAP adapter on Windows, bypassing the TAP-Windows application that creates OpenVPN's TAP virtual adapter (my hunch is TAP-Windows may not be fully Windows 10 compatible, and/or may only demonstrate an issue when installed within a specific environment [which would explain why it would be packaged within a stable OpenVPN build])

• OpenVPN itself is separate from the actual virtual ethernet adapter

It's also recommend posting on the OpenVPN forum, either by creating your own thread or posting in a relevant one.

If you can positively identify OpenVPN as the cause, you should create a bug report

• See TracReports for help on using and creating reports

 

Umm, never ever ever EVER uninstall a program before upgrading. Why? I'll tell you why from personal experience. I have NVIDIA GeFORCE 980X on my pc at home. I upgraded from Windows 7 to Windows 8.1, no problem. Then I upgraded from Windows 8.1 to Windows 10 Home, still no problem. But then I messed around with my System Registry by changing permissions, deleting files, and writing new files. Stuff became wacky, so I had to Reset my computer. Well I didn't know that by resetting my computer, I'd be getting rid of important driver upgrades for my NVIDIA. So if you "uninstall" something before upgrading, you are essentially doing the same exact thing as what I did when I reset my computer. Disable a program, yes, perfectly acceptable. Uninstall it, very very dumb.

 

I would recommend not providing advice unless you fully understand the advice you're attempting to give.

First and foremost, your personal experience had zero to do with uninstalling a program, such as internet security suites or others that have deep hooks within Windows, and everything to do with screwing around in the registry and performing tasks you didn't fully understand, or had no understanding of at all. You yourself even state you didn't uninstall a program, so it's a tad perplexing how you've come to the conclusion you have.

• Unless you know exactly what it is you're doing, you should not be modifying the registry, period. The registry is the nervous system of your PC and modifying values and permissions, with little to no understanding of what it is you're doing, is a recipe for disaster. I'm baffled by why you even started modifying the registry, as it doesn't appear you had a clear understanding of what you were attempting to do, nor does there appear to have been a legitimate reason for doing so.

Secondly, prior to upgrading any OS, programs requiring deep hooks within Windows, such as Internet Security Suites and stateful firewalls, must be uninstalled before doing so. Failing to do so will more often than not lead to issues, of which may or may not be apparent right away. If you would like to understand why, please use google or another search engine for research.

Lastly, upgraded OSes are a bad idea to run, as 99% of the time the end user will spend far more time troubleshooting issues that will pop up due to the upgrade than it would have taken to simply perform a clean install and do it properly.