newby help!?

Hi.
I don't know if anyone can help, or point me in the direction of a man who
can, as the saying goes, but I'm seriously tearing my hair out, after an
entire day of being messed around by my home network setup.

Basically, here's the profile. A couple of months ago I bought a broadband
adsl router and two wireless cards, one for each of the pc's at home. The
router is plugged into the phone socket downstairs, and mine and my
girlfriend's pc's are upstairs, in our respective offices. When I try and
connect both pc's to the router, using their wireless cards, and no
security, everything is fine.

If I try and set up some kind of encription, be it WPA or WEP based,
suddenly, things go wrong. One PC uses XP, and the other Win2K, but I
downloaded a WPA utility for the Win2K machine, so it should cope.

Just taking the one machine, the XP one, for simplicity's sake, I keep
having trouble connecting to the router. Everything's fine, I'm all
connected, and then I'll go to send an email or something, and Outlook will
report, 'couldn't find server'. When I check in the system tray, my
wireless icon says 'not connected'. If I call up the 'view available
wireless' box, I can see my router listed, and when I click on it it says
disconnected in the status section, but then, further down, it says 'you are
connected to this netowrk. to disconnect, click' etc etc etc. The icon in
the system tray claims 'not connected', but the available wireless list
tells me I can only disconnect. Confusing? I have gained access to my
router, and disabled the security, by restoring factory settings and
configuring the WAN connection all over again, but the problem persists.
About once every five minutes I just get kicked off the router. I run a
software firewall, sygate, as well as the router's inherent firewall, and
wonder if this is anything to do with the problem.

I don't know a great deal about networking or wireless connectivity, and the
router's mannual is crap, it's a D-Link. The same thing just keeps
happening though. I'll establish a connection, go off and do some work,
come back, and hey, I'm disconnected. Sometimes it will simply reconnect of
it's own free will, sometimes not, sometimes I have to start from scratch by
restoring the defaults on the router. And this is all without even turning
the other pc on.

I know this is a bit vague, but the mannual, as I say, is rubbish, and I'm
not quite sure where to go for help. I wonder if there's a third party
software sweet, other than Windows default networking software, that I could
install on each of the two machines to administor and run the network and
router connections, that might prove easier and better. Any ideas?
Sometimes I can't get a page on Internet Explorer, and can't connect to my
email server using Outlook, even though the icon in the system tray claims
to be connected. It's just a total mystery to me.

All I want to do is set up the router and two pc's, each with a wireless
card, so taht each can access the router independantly of each other,
regardless of whether both machines are on or off. I didn't know it would
be so complex. Has this rambling rubbish made any sense, and can anyone
help? Thanks.

I have XP running on my machines and had to go on Microsoft for a patch
to do encryption. Mine would work fine without encryption but as soon
as I turned it on, the connection went. I don't know if the same
applies to Win2K.

Good luck,
Mike.

The Crow wrote:
> Hi.
> I don't know if anyone can help, or point me in the direction of a man who
> can, as the saying goes, but I'm seriously tearing my hair out, after an
> entire day of being messed around by my home network setup.
>
> Basically, here's the profile. A couple of months ago I bought a broadband
> adsl router and two wireless cards, one for each of the pc's at home. The
> router is plugged into the phone socket downstairs, and mine and my
> girlfriend's pc's are upstairs, in our respective offices. When I try and
> connect both pc's to the router, using their wireless cards, and no
> security, everything is fine.
>
> If I try and set up some kind of encription, be it WPA or WEP based,
> suddenly, things go wrong. One PC uses XP, and the other Win2K, but I
> downloaded a WPA utility for the Win2K machine, so it should cope.
>
> Just taking the one machine, the XP one, for simplicity's sake, I keep
> having trouble connecting to the router. Everything's fine, I'm all
> connected, and then I'll go to send an email or something, and Outlook will
> report, 'couldn't find server'. When I check in the system tray, my
> wireless icon says 'not connected'. If I call up the 'view available
> wireless' box, I can see my router listed, and when I click on it it says
> disconnected in the status section, but then, further down, it says 'you are
> connected to this netowrk. to disconnect, click' etc etc etc. The icon in
> the system tray claims 'not connected', but the available wireless list
> tells me I can only disconnect. Confusing? I have gained access to my
> router, and disabled the security, by restoring factory settings and
> configuring the WAN connection all over again, but the problem persists.
> About once every five minutes I just get kicked off the router. I run a
> software firewall, sygate, as well as the router's inherent firewall, and
> wonder if this is anything to do with the problem.
>
> I don't know a great deal about networking or wireless connectivity, and the
> router's mannual is crap, it's a D-Link. The same thing just keeps
> happening though. I'll establish a connection, go off and do some work,
> come back, and hey, I'm disconnected. Sometimes it will simply reconnect of
> it's own free will, sometimes not, sometimes I have to start from scratch by
> restoring the defaults on the router. And this is all without even turning
> the other pc on.
>
> I know this is a bit vague, but the mannual, as I say, is rubbish, and I'm
> not quite sure where to go for help. I wonder if there's a third party
> software sweet, other than Windows default networking software, that I could
> install on each of the two machines to administor and run the network and
> router connections, that might prove easier and better. Any ideas?
> Sometimes I can't get a page on Internet Explorer, and can't connect to my
> email server using Outlook, even though the icon in the system tray claims
> to be connected. It's just a total mystery to me.
>
> All I want to do is set up the router and two pc's, each with a wireless
> card, so taht each can access the router independantly of each other,
> regardless of whether both machines are on or off. I didn't know it would
> be so complex. Has this rambling rubbish made any sense, and can anyone
> help? Thanks.
>
>

"Mike" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:zXy8d.205512$(E-Mail Removed).. .
>I have XP running on my machines and had to go on Microsoft for a patch to
>do encryption. Mine would work fine without encryption but as soon as I
>turned it on, the connection went. I don't know if the same applies to
>Win2K.
>
> Good luck,
> Mike.
>
> The Crow wrote:
>> Hi.
>> I don't know if anyone can help, or point me in the direction of a man
>> who can, as the saying goes, but I'm seriously tearing my hair out, after
>> an entire day of being messed around by my home network setup.
>>
>> Basically, here's the profile. A couple of months ago I bought a
>> broadband adsl router and two wireless cards, one for each of the pc's at
>> home. The router is plugged into the phone socket downstairs, and mine
>> and my girlfriend's pc's are upstairs, in our respective offices. When I
>> try and connect both pc's to the router, using their wireless cards, and
>> no security, everything is fine.
>>
>> If I try and set up some kind of encription, be it WPA or WEP based,
>> suddenly, things go wrong. One PC uses XP, and the other Win2K, but I
>> downloaded a WPA utility for the Win2K machine, so it should cope.
>>
>> Just taking the one machine, the XP one, for simplicity's sake, I keep
>> having trouble connecting to the router. Everything's fine, I'm all
>> connected, and then I'll go to send an email or something, and Outlook
>> will report, 'couldn't find server'. When I check in the system tray, my
>> wireless icon says 'not connected'. If I call up the 'view available
>> wireless' box, I can see my router listed, and when I click on it it says
>> disconnected in the status section, but then, further down, it says 'you
>> are connected to this netowrk. to disconnect, click' etc etc etc. The
>> icon in the system tray claims 'not connected', but the available
>> wireless list tells me I can only disconnect. Confusing? I have gained
>> access to my router, and disabled the security, by restoring factory
>> settings and configuring the WAN connection all over again, but the
>> problem persists. About once every five minutes I just get kicked off the
>> router. I run a software firewall, sygate, as well as the router's
>> inherent firewall, and wonder if this is anything to do with the problem.
>>
>> I don't know a great deal about networking or wireless connectivity, and
>> the router's mannual is crap, it's a D-Link. The same thing just keeps
>> happening though. I'll establish a connection, go off and do some work,
>> come back, and hey, I'm disconnected. Sometimes it will simply reconnect
>> of it's own free will, sometimes not, sometimes I have to start from
>> scratch by restoring the defaults on the router. And this is all without
>> even turning the other pc on.
>>
>> I know this is a bit vague, but the mannual, as I say, is rubbish, and
>> I'm not quite sure where to go for help. I wonder if there's a third
>> party software sweet, other than Windows default networking software,
>> that I could install on each of the two machines to administor and run
>> the network and router connections, that might prove easier and better.
>> Any ideas? Sometimes I can't get a page on Internet Explorer, and can't
>> connect to my email server using Outlook, even though the icon in the
>> system tray claims to be connected. It's just a total mystery to me.
>>
>> All I want to do is set up the router and two pc's, each with a wireless
>> card, so taht each can access the router independantly of each other,
>> regardless of whether both machines are on or off. I didn't know it
>> would be so complex. Has this rambling rubbish made any sense, and can
>> anyone help? Thanks.

Have you tried the new wireless network wizard in XP service pack 2?

Some friends have tried it and said it cleared up all of their connectivity
problems. Worth a shot.


"Mike" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:zXy8d.205512$(E-Mail Removed).. .
>I have XP running on my machines and had to go on Microsoft for a patch to
>do encryption. Mine would work fine without encryption but as soon as I
>turned it on, the connection went. I don't know if the same applies to
>Win2K.
>
> Good luck,
> Mike.
>
> The Crow wrote:
>> Hi.
>> I don't know if anyone can help, or point me in the direction of a man
>> who can, as the saying goes, but I'm seriously tearing my hair out, after
>> an entire day of being messed around by my home network setup.
>>
>> Basically, here's the profile. A couple of months ago I bought a
>> broadband adsl router and two wireless cards, one for each of the pc's at
>> home. The router is plugged into the phone socket downstairs, and mine
>> and my girlfriend's pc's are upstairs, in our respective offices. When I
>> try and connect both pc's to the router, using their wireless cards, and
>> no security, everything is fine.
>>
>> If I try and set up some kind of encription, be it WPA or WEP based,
>> suddenly, things go wrong. One PC uses XP, and the other Win2K, but I
>> downloaded a WPA utility for the Win2K machine, so it should cope.
>>
>> Just taking the one machine, the XP one, for simplicity's sake, I keep
>> having trouble connecting to the router. Everything's fine, I'm all
>> connected, and then I'll go to send an email or something, and Outlook
>> will report, 'couldn't find server'. When I check in the system tray, my
>> wireless icon says 'not connected'. If I call up the 'view available
>> wireless' box, I can see my router listed, and when I click on it it says
>> disconnected in the status section, but then, further down, it says 'you
>> are connected to this netowrk. to disconnect, click' etc etc etc. The
>> icon in the system tray claims 'not connected', but the available
>> wireless list tells me I can only disconnect. Confusing? I have gained
>> access to my router, and disabled the security, by restoring factory
>> settings and configuring the WAN connection all over again, but the
>> problem persists. About once every five minutes I just get kicked off the
>> router. I run a software firewall, sygate, as well as the router's
>> inherent firewall, and wonder if this is anything to do with the problem.
>>
>> I don't know a great deal about networking or wireless connectivity, and
>> the router's mannual is crap, it's a D-Link. The same thing just keeps
>> happening though. I'll establish a connection, go off and do some work,
>> come back, and hey, I'm disconnected. Sometimes it will simply reconnect
>> of it's own free will, sometimes not, sometimes I have to start from
>> scratch by restoring the defaults on the router. And this is all without
>> even turning the other pc on.
>>
>> I know this is a bit vague, but the mannual, as I say, is rubbish, and
>> I'm not quite sure where to go for help. I wonder if there's a third
>> party software sweet, other than Windows default networking software,
>> that I could install on each of the two machines to administor and run
>> the network and router connections, that might prove easier and better.
>> Any ideas? Sometimes I can't get a page on Internet Explorer, and can't
>> connect to my email server using Outlook, even though the icon in the
>> system tray claims to be connected. It's just a total mystery to me.
>>
>> All I want to do is set up the router and two pc's, each with a wireless
>> card, so taht each can access the router independantly of each other,
>> regardless of whether both machines are on or off. I didn't know it
>> would be so complex. Has this rambling rubbish made any sense, and can
>> anyone help? Thanks.

"Mike" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:zXy8d.205512$(E-Mail Removed).. .
>I have XP running on my machines and had to go on Microsoft for a patch to
>do encryption. Mine would work fine without encryption but as soon as I
>turned it on, the connection went. I don't know if the same applies to
>Win2K.
>
That's very interesting, the win2k machine doesn't have the problem, so it's
only the xp machine I'm trying to sort out. What was the patch? Thanks.

Try http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=826942

Mike

"The Crow" <crappy.mesh-(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:4162a63a$0$54805$(E-Mail Removed)...
> Hi.
> I don't know if anyone can help, or point me in the direction of a man who
> can, as the saying goes, but I'm seriously tearing my hair out, after an
> entire day of being messed around by my home network setup.
>
> Basically, here's the profile. A couple of months ago I bought a
> broadband
> adsl router and two wireless cards, one for each of the pc's at home. The
> router is plugged into the phone socket downstairs, and mine and my
> girlfriend's pc's are upstairs, in our respective offices. When I try and
> connect both pc's to the router, using their wireless cards, and no
> security, everything is fine.
>
> If I try and set up some kind of encription, be it WPA or WEP based,
> suddenly, things go wrong. One PC uses XP, and the other Win2K, but I
> downloaded a WPA utility for the Win2K machine, so it should cope.
>
> Just taking the one machine, the XP one, for simplicity's sake, I keep
> having trouble connecting to the router. Everything's fine, I'm all
> connected, and then I'll go to send an email or something, and Outlook
> will
> report, 'couldn't find server'. When I check in the system tray, my
> wireless icon says 'not connected'. If I call up the 'view available
> wireless' box, I can see my router listed, and when I click on it it says
> disconnected in the status section, but then, further down, it says 'you
> are
> connected to this netowrk. to disconnect, click' etc etc etc. The icon
> in
> the system tray claims 'not connected', but the available wireless list
> tells me I can only disconnect. Confusing? I have gained access to my
> router, and disabled the security, by restoring factory settings and
> configuring the WAN connection all over again, but the problem persists.
> About once every five minutes I just get kicked off the router. I run a
> software firewall, sygate, as well as the router's inherent firewall, and
> wonder if this is anything to do with the problem.
>
> I don't know a great deal about networking or wireless connectivity, and
> the
> router's mannual is crap, it's a D-Link. The same thing just keeps
> happening though. I'll establish a connection, go off and do some work,
> come back, and hey, I'm disconnected. Sometimes it will simply reconnect
> of
> it's own free will, sometimes not, sometimes I have to start from scratch
> by
> restoring the defaults on the router. And this is all without even
> turning
> the other pc on.
>
> I know this is a bit vague, but the mannual, as I say, is rubbish, and I'm
> not quite sure where to go for help. I wonder if there's a third party
> software sweet, other than Windows default networking software, that I
> could
> install on each of the two machines to administor and run the network and
> router connections, that might prove easier and better. Any ideas?
> Sometimes I can't get a page on Internet Explorer, and can't connect to my
> email server using Outlook, even though the icon in the system tray claims
> to be connected. It's just a total mystery to me.
>
> All I want to do is set up the router and two pc's, each with a wireless
> card, so taht each can access the router independantly of each other,
> regardless of whether both machines are on or off. I didn't know it would
> be so complex. Has this rambling rubbish made any sense, and can anyone
> help? Thanks.
>
>