ethernet overlay wifi?

[blue lasers]

hey guys i got a USB adapter to Ethernet cable for my tablet pc and what i want is when i connect the Ethernet on my tablet to disconnect from the wireless network and use the wired one for internet.
thanks
i have windows7 ultimate BTW

 

[enigmahack]

Sure - this is pretty easy.

You have to change what's called the "Metric" in Windows. The metric, when set to a lower number, is the priority of the connection. When disconnected, the metric turns 'off'. Now if you're running Windows 7 Ultimate, it SHOULD automatically use an Ethernet connection but because it's a USB device, it might be losing priority.

If you're using a tablet, why don't you just hit the "wifi off" button or there isn't one?

About changing the metric:

Go into your windows control panel, and look for the Network places/Networks and Connections.

In the top left, you should see "Advanced settings" or something like that (I'm at work, we have WinXP so I'm doing this from memory)

In your advanced settings you might see a few different network adapters. We need to set the metric for these adapters telling windows to use one over another.

Right click on the wireless adapter, select Properties.
Look for something that says "TCP/IP v4" and select it. Click the properties button in that panel.

The new one that comes up should have DNS and DHCP settings on it somewhere with "Advanced" in the bottom right. Click Advanced.

See at the bottom of the IP Tab? You should see something checkmarked that says "Automatic Metric"

Change that so it's unchecked and you can put a number in the box. Put in 10 here.

Now go back to the USB ethernet and do the exact same thing, but make the number less than 10.

That way, when Windows has an Ethernet connection it will "prefer" this connection. Alternatively if it's not available it will use the wireless connection

Hopefully my steps are right, but if not, I'll update when I get home from Work in around 6 hours.

 

[enigmahack]

Just wanted to add, just in case:

Change the interface metric on a network adapter | Windows Reference

This is the visual "how to" for Windows 7

 

[blue lasers]

Didn't work. I'll try restarting it and edit the post
Edit: didn't work

 

[enigmahack]

Definitely should work. I suspect it has SOMETHING to do with the fact that it's USB, though it really shouldn't. I've been using this on my servers for years now.

The only "easy" suggestion I have is to simply disable the wireless connection when plugged into ethernet. Some applications (Like my work VPN application) detects the connection state for me and automatically determines LCR (Least-Cost Routing) but that's a dedicated piece of software.

Let me see if I can find another solution that might work for you.

 

[enigmahack]

Okay, someone posted this:

1.Start > Control Panel > Network and Sharing Center
2.on the left side panel, click on 'Change adapter settings'
3.Press and release the Alt button
4.From the menu click on Advanced > Advanced Settings
5.In the "Connections" pane, click on the up or down arrow to re-order the connections in the order you want Windows network services to use them.

See if that makes any difference, though the automatic metric should be working. (I blame USB, but who knows how Windows 7 handles it now.)

Try that and see if it works.

 

[blue lasers]

thanks for the help it didn't work,i ll just manually disable wifi