Let me be blunt: my PC and I have been going through a rough patch. A series of misunderstandings resulted in it refusing to let me access the internet. I was away for a week, and couldn’t use my PC. This really pissed it off, cause it’s not used to being ignored for such long periods. The LAN card apparently packed up and was about to leave. I sat it down, held its hand and told it that perhaps it would help if we spent some time apart. I disabled the LAN card from the BIOS, waited for a couple of days before turning it on today. It works!