Connectivity problems
 

I've searched around and I can't seem to come up with a resonable solution to my problem. I start gentoo and I have internet for varying amounts of time but at some point the connection dies. This is a recent problem, it has appeared approxiamtely a week ago. I've tried using
ifconfig eth0 down
ifconfig eth0 up
but this doesn't bring it back

any ideas on what I can look at?

edit:
forgot to add I'm connected to a router which connects to cable internet. I can't ping or log into the router from this machine.

Can you ping the router when the connection to the internet is lost? Bringing the interface on your host up and down will not reset the connection between your router and ISP. Next time you can't connect to the internet, try pinging your router. If successful, it is a router ISP issue, not a Linux one.