Let's add a few more steps before you do the rest

does the system have a NIC
is a cable plugged into it and going to the wall/switch
is the link state of the card up or down (e.g. do you see glowing LEDs on the card

now continue with the rest of the questions, heheh

> Does the box have an IP address?
>    ifconfig
> Can you ping other boxes on the same subnet?
>    ping <some-ip-here>
> Does the box have a default gateway?
>    route -n
> Can you ping the gateway?
>    ping <gw-ip-here>
> Do you have DNS servers configured?
>    cat /etc/resolv.conf
> Can you ping hosts by IP on the Internet?
>    ping 66.218.71.198
> Is DNS resolving names?
>    host yahoo.com
> Can you ping hosts by name on the Internet?
>    ping yahoo.com