>>>>What do they mean by the appropriate utility or facility? Any other suggestions? TIA
>>>
>>>They probably mean check configuration of the router. Some routers are configured using a program, others may have a web interface, and still others might have a direct connect port (like a RS-232 port).
>>>One thing you probably want to check -- especially if you've using DHCP. Double-check to make sure whatever addresses you're assigning to devices as static address isn't part of the pool used by DHCP. If there are some that are assigned statically to devices, you should reserve those addresses at the DHCP server (typically by pairing the address with the MAC address of the device).
>>
>>I will make a note for myself to check all these settings in the router. But for now, as I updated my post, the problem was resolved by turning the router Off/On.
>>Thank you.
>
>Power cycling (i.e. turn it off, wait a bit, then turn it back on) is OK. What you *don't* want to do is to use that reset button (i.e. the one accessed through a tiny hole through which y9u push an object like opened paper clip).. That happened at work -- twice. Each of those times I was at a customer site (which happened to be a six hour drive away). Due to some problems they were having with the Internet connection (turned out it was a problem with the service provider's network) -- they tried power-cycling (due to their impatience, they were flicking the power switch off then back on in rapid succession -- several times -- something I'd told folks NOT to do). Since their attempts at power cycling weren't giving any results (and even if they did things right, it wouldn't have fixed things since the problem was at the service provider), someone got the bright idea to do the hard reset -- which of course meant the firewall/router lost *all* the settings. More items to add to the comedy of errors:
>* The tech support at the service provider wasn't familiar with Spanish, so an internal notice about an equipment failure at a facility in La Cañada Flintridge (a city in Los Angles county) was misread as being in Canada -- and since Canada is far away from Los Angeles, the notice was ignored.
>* With guidance from the tech support at the service provider, the network cabling was reconfigured into a nonsensical fashion (mostly with inputs and outputs reversed) -- this occurred before someone at the office called me.

The takeaway from this case: everybody should learn Spanish :). Thank you for sharing.