Acer notebook says connected but will not...

Click START
Click Run
Type CMD and press ENTER
Enter IPCONFIG/ALL and press ENTER

Does your IP-address start with '169.254.xxx.yyy' or with '192.168.aa.bb' ?

Do you have any "firewall" software installed? (Zonalarm? Comodo Firewall?)
Such software can *BLOCK* all connections,
including the TCP/IP traffic that asks the router for an IP-address,
while the network-adapter still shows "connected".