stale_hermit ([info]stale_hermit) wrote,
@ 2008-04-26 10:51:00
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Current mood:frustrated

Little help??
I have been squatting on Mark's desktop PC's web connection because my own wireless connection Will Not Work. This has been an immensely frustrating month. Anyone with any idea as to what I can try to fix this, please let me know.-

The problem came on little by little throughout March. Sometimes I'd try to open my browser (firefox, usually, but IE won't work either) and it wouldn't load the page. "check the connection". I'd check the connection, reboot the DSL box, restart my laptop, and eventually it'd come back up, not by any pattern I can note. Until the day it didn't.

I can plug the DSL line right into the laptop and it works fine.

Windows on the laptop can "see" our household network. But-- the Linksys wireless card icon in the laptop toolbar is grayed out. When I run through the Linksys setups, everything looks fine. Linksys says it's all correct. It just won't "connect".

Interestingly enough. The browser _will_ connect to a local neighborhood network: one where the homepage loads and the site asks for a credit card number to let you actually use that access pt. So I haven't actually done that.

I can probably scrape up $50 or so for a new wireless card, but I'm not convinced I need to, or even that it will help. What am I missing from this puzzle????


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[info]noeltheone
2008-04-26 04:29 pm UTC (link)
Sounds like one of the following:

* The router has security (WEP/WPA) turned on and your laptop doesn't have the right key.

* The router has MAC address filtering turned on, and it has lost your MAC address

* The router's wireless broadcast is flaking out, so you are getting enough signal to see it, but not enough to connect.

* Your wireless card is flaking out, so....

I would check the router settings first, then try the following:

* Try to connect with the laptop right next to the router. If the signal is marginal, that might work.

* If you have any other wireless enabled computer, can it connect?

If those don't work, I probably have a card I could you send you. Do you have a PCMCIA slot, or do use a USB card?

Also, a new wireless card shouldn't be anything close to $50. More like $10-15 these days, particuarly if you are willing to hit eBay or can catch them on the Deal a Day sites.

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[info]stale_hermit
2008-04-27 12:35 am UTC (link)
Mine is the only wireless-enabled beast in the house --consequences of Mark moving in first. Otherwise, by ghod, I'd have the bloody DSL directly hooked up to the pc of the person who's home all day trying to get some work done!!!!

Glad to hear prices aren't so bad; I was basing the $50 on Mark's guess. I may take you up on that offer. I have a PCMCIA slot; right now I have a Linksys Wireless G Adapter (WPC54G). Do they wear out? This one is nearly as old as the laptop (six yrs old).

re: WEP security--I've deinstalled and reinstalled three times, setting up the WEP 128 bit key and passphrase each time. We've always had the same WEP, no change, and I've never changed the key on the laptop.

re: router -- I had our ISP (Frontiernet, out here) log on remotely to Mark's PC and check; the router looked fine. Moving the laptop closer doesn't change the problem in any way. The speed measured by Windows is actually pretty good (11 Mbps at the low end, up to 54).

I've run troubleshooters all over the place and Windows and Linksys both say the card works fine, but Linksys won't connect it. Something tells me I've got something messed up in the set-up software, but so far as I can tell, I'm doing exactly the same things I did when I first set this up in January. Have NO IDEA what made it flake out in the first place in March-- but the fact that it was so apparently random and built up to this tends to make me think it's a card issue, no matter what the troubleshooter says.

How do I figure out what the MAC address should be, if that's the trouble?

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