Help! XP wireless not working

Hi all,

I'm suddenly having a problem with wireless access at home via a work
provided laptop (which means I'm limited in what I can do to it).

The hardware involved is:
- IBM Thinkpad T41 (a real one - not Lenovo)
w/ Intel Pro/Wireless LAN 2100 3B Mini PCI NIC (54G)
XP pro (SP2)
Cisco VPN

- Netgear WG511T PCMCIA NIC (Rev-A 108/Super-G)
driver ver 4.2.2.14 (latest)
utility ver 2.64.33.3 (latest)

- Netgear WGT624 Router

I use the internal NIC when roaming at the office, but at home I like
to use the faster Netgear card. Both worked fine until about a week
ago when IT pushed some kind of upgrade. That same night the troubles
began.

Suddenly the Netgear card hung the computer whenever it was inserted.
I tried the card in a different slot - no hang but it didn't work.
Tried it in another laptop and it worked fine. I tried
uninstalling/reinstalling the Netgear drivers and software after which
the computer hung with the card in either slot.

After a few go rounds, I gave up on Netgear and tried the internal
Intel NIC using Windows wireless configuration (as I use it at work).
It didn't work either - wouldn't even see my network until I disabled
WPA encryption on the router. But even with encryption off it
wouldn't connect to my router. Thinking the Intel NIC didn't like the
Netgear Auto-108 mode, I switched the router first to G-only then to
B-or-G. Still no connection (and no, I don't have address filtering
turned on). I tried to connect to my neighbor who foolishly runs an
open Linksys network - no luck.

Meanwhile, my personal laptop is humming along perfectly content.

Then I remembered that the Netgear drivers were still installed.
Thinking all the gyrations had made a mess, I uninstalled them again
and ran Registry Mechanic to clean up any dribbles left in the
registry. Checked by inserting the card and inspecting with the
device manager.

Still no luck. The internal NIC seems to work fine at the office so
IT won't help me figure it out (not that they could ... I generally
know more than they do and their answer to everything is to re-image
the computer) - but it won't work at home. I can't get the Netgear
card to work at all despite the fact that it works fine in another
computer. I'm afraid the update they pushed a week ago was/is the
source of the problem and re-imaging won't solve it because I'll just
get it again. Not to mention that I'll lose all my customizations and
have to spend hours fixing everything again.

What the heck could have happened? I'm sure there is no malware and
the problem started just hours after a major software update.

Any thoughts?
George
--
for email reply remove "/" from address

George Neuner wrote:
> Both worked fine until about a week
> ago when IT pushed some kind of upgrade.

> What the heck could have happened?

On May 4, 1:43*pm, George Neuner <gneuner2/@/comcast.net> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I'm suddenly having a problem with wireless access at home via a work
> provided laptop (which means I'm limited in what I can do to it). *
>
> The hardware involved is:
> * - IBM Thinkpad T41 (a real one - not Lenovo)
> * * * w/ Intel Pro/Wireless LAN 2100 3B Mini PCI NIC (54G)
> * * * XP pro (SP2)
> * * * Cisco VPN
>
> * - Netgear WG511T PCMCIA NIC (Rev-A 108/Super-G)
> * * * driver ver 4.2.2.14 (latest)
> * * * utility ver 2.64.33.3 (latest)
>
> * - Netgear WGT624 Router
>
> I use the internal NIC when roaming at the office, but at home I like
> to use the faster Netgear card. *Both worked fine until about a week
> ago when IT pushed some kind of upgrade. *That same night the troubles
> began.
>
> Suddenly the Netgear card hung the computer whenever it was inserted.
> I tried the card in a different slot - no hang but it didn't work.
> Tried it in another laptop and it worked fine. *I tried
> uninstalling/reinstalling the Netgear drivers and software after which
> the computer hung with the card in either slot.
>
> After a few go rounds, I gave up on Netgear and tried the internal
> Intel NIC using Windows wireless configuration (as I use it at work).
> It didn't work either - wouldn't even see my network until I disabled
> WPA encryption on the router. *But even with encryption off it
> wouldn't connect to my router. *Thinking the Intel NIC didn't like the
> Netgear Auto-108 mode, I switched the router first to G-only then to
> B-or-G. *Still no connection (and no, I don't have address filtering
> turned on). *I tried to connect to my neighbor who foolishly runs an
> open Linksys network - no luck.
>
> Meanwhile, my personal laptop is humming along perfectly content.
>
> Then I remembered that the Netgear drivers were still installed.
> Thinking all the gyrations had made a mess, I uninstalled them again
> and ran Registry Mechanic to clean up any dribbles left in the
> registry. *Checked by inserting the card and inspecting with the
> device manager.
>
> Still no luck. *The internal NIC seems to work fine at the office so
> IT won't help me figure it out (not that they could ... I generally
> know more than they do and their answer to everything is to re-image
> the computer) - but it won't work at home. *I can't get the Netgear
> card to work at all despite the fact that it works fine in another
> computer. *I'm afraid the update they pushed a week ago was/is the
> source of the problem and re-imaging won't solve it because I'll just
> get it again. *Not to mention that I'll lose all my customizations and
> have to spend hours fixing everything again.
>
> What the heck could have happened? *I'm sure there is no malware and
> the problem started just hours after a major software update.
>
> Any thoughts?
> George
> --
> for email reply remove "/" from address

You might ask your IT group if the modifications they rolled down the
network to your computer actually disabled access to all wireless
networks except those which match their own parameters. This might be
one of their ways of keeping tighter control on (a) what the machine
is used for and (b) what is allowed to intentionally or
unintentionally find its way onto the machine.

On May 4, 7:42 pm, Dave <davidjchurch...@gmail.com> wrote:

> You might ask your IT group if the modifications they rolled down the
> network to your computer actually disabled access to all wireless
> networks except those which match their own parameters. This might be
> one of their ways of keeping tighter control on (a) what the machine
> is used for and (b) what is allowed to intentionally or
> unintentionally find its way onto the machine.


Sounds like a good lead. Perhaps it's some restriction your IT setup
(via update) in the Group Policy ? One can appreciate that there
would be reasons for restrictions.

Doesn't sound like a typical driver/hardware problem. Not across two
different wireless adapters. Have you tried installing another (not
the netgear) adapter - a USB one, say?

--------------------------------------------------

Jeff L, on another current thread, mentions approaching problems by
asking the question in reverse, so the question here might be:

How do you set up an xp machine so that it could only connect to one
wireless network and that additional wireless network adapters could
not be installed ? And prevent the user from changing that setting?


Very clear, well informed problem description by the way.

Steve