Windows 2000 and WPA

I'm new to wireless networking. I'm trying to use an older laptop with
a Belkin F5D7010 CardBus wireless card (802.11b) under Windows 2000 to
connect to a classroom wireless LAN which uses WPA authentication and
encryption.

Unfortunately as I understand it W2k has no native support for WPA. The
Belkin driver/configuration utility I can get from their website only
does 128-bit WEP and hence I can't make a connection to the classroom's
wireless router. Is there any freeware utilities that would allow me to
use this card with WPA? There doesn't seem to be anything on Belkin's
site that would help me.

Upgrading to XP is not an option for me due to lack of CPU power and RAM
in the laptop as well as cost.
--
To reply, my gmail address is nojay1 Robert Sneddon

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>, Robert Sneddon
says...
> I'm new to wireless networking. I'm trying to use an older laptop with
> a Belkin F5D7010 CardBus wireless card (802.11b) under Windows 2000 to
> connect to a classroom wireless LAN which uses WPA authentication and
> encryption.
>
> Unfortunately as I understand it W2k has no native support for WPA. The
> Belkin driver/configuration utility I can get from their website only
> does 128-bit WEP and hence I can't make a connection to the classroom's
> wireless router. Is there any freeware utilities that would allow me to
> use this card with WPA? There doesn't seem to be anything on Belkin's
> site that would help me.
>
> Upgrading to XP is not an option for me due to lack of CPU power and RAM
> in the laptop as well as cost.
>
Why? WinXP will run on a Pentium 2 with 128MB.

--
Conor

Sig under construction. Please check back when Duke Nukem Forever ships
and/or Windows Vista is released.

In message <(E-Mail Removed)> , Conor
<(E-Mail Removed)> writes
>In article <(E-Mail Removed)>, Robert Sneddon
>says...
>> I'm new to wireless networking. I'm trying to use an older laptop with
>> a Belkin F5D7010 CardBus wireless card (802.11b) under Windows 2000 to
>> connect to a classroom wireless LAN which uses WPA authentication and
>> encryption.
>>
>> Unfortunately as I understand it W2k has no native support for WPA.
>>
>> Upgrading to XP is not an option for me due to lack of CPU power and RAM
>> in the laptop as well as cost.
>>
>Why? WinXP will run on a Pentium 2 with 128MB.

I'm running several memory-intensive programs on this laptop and it is
already hitting the hard drive for virtual memory quite a lot.
--
To reply, my gmail address is nojay1 Robert Sneddon

"Conor" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed) t...
>> Upgrading to XP is not an option for me due to lack of CPU power and RAM
>> in the laptop as well as cost.
>>
> Why? WinXP will run on a Pentium 2 with 128MB.
>

Not very pleasant though. I wouldn't run XP with less than 512 personally

"Robert Sneddon" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news(E-Mail Removed)...
> I'm new to wireless networking. I'm trying to use an older laptop with
> a Belkin F5D7010 CardBus wireless card (802.11b) under Windows 2000 to
> connect to a classroom wireless LAN which uses WPA authentication and
> encryption.
>
> Unfortunately as I understand it W2k has no native support for WPA.

You don;t say which varient of WPA.......

> The
> Belkin driver/configuration utility I can get from their website only
> does 128-bit WEP and hence I can't make a connection to the classroom's
> wireless router. Is there any freeware utilities that would allow me to
> use this card with WPA? There doesn't seem to be anything on Belkin's
> site that would help me.
>

I have not found anything that makes a good job of this on Windows/2k.

> Upgrading to XP is not an option for me due to lack of CPU power and RAM
> in the laptop as well as cost.
> --
> To reply, my gmail address is nojay1 Robert Sneddon

Please don't expect e-mail replies, its considered rude...

"Robert Sneddon" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news(E-Mail Removed)...
> I'm new to wireless networking. I'm trying to use an older laptop with
> a Belkin F5D7010 CardBus wireless card (802.11b) under Windows 2000 to
> connect to a classroom wireless LAN which uses WPA authentication and
> encryption.
>
> Unfortunately as I understand it W2k has no native support for WPA. The
> Belkin driver/configuration utility I can get from their website only
> does 128-bit WEP and hence I can't make a connection to the classroom's
> wireless router. Is there any freeware utilities that would allow me to
> use this card with WPA? There doesn't seem to be anything on Belkin's
> site that would help me.
>
> Upgrading to XP is not an option for me due to lack of CPU power and RAM
> in the laptop as well as cost.

What about updating to a 3-com card. Some of these do support WPA on W2k
(not very well though).

> --
> To reply, my gmail address is nojay1 Robert Sneddon

In message <(E-Mail Removed)>, David Wade
<(E-Mail Removed)> writes
>
>"Robert Sneddon" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
>news(E-Mail Removed)...
>> I'm trying to use an older laptop with
>> a Belkin F5D7010 CardBus wireless card (802.11b) under Windows 2000 to
>> connect to a classroom wireless LAN which uses WPA authentication and
>> encryption.
>>
>What about updating to a 3-com card. Some of these do support WPA on W2k
>(not very well though).

I was given the Belkin card by a friend who's moved to Apple kit mostly
-- his only MS laptop has XP running on it with a built-in wireless
adaptor. I just wondered if there was any easy method of adding WPA
functionality to W2K. I might have to flash the Belkin card with new
firmware as well, perhaps.

I found a reference through Google to a freeware W2k driver from
Macafee that might do the job but it's rather confusing and the HOWTO
..pdfs the Macafee site lists don't include the Belkin card.
--
To reply, my gmail address is nojay1 Robert Sneddon

In message <5K6dnYfbjs-(E-Mail Removed)>, David Wade
<(E-Mail Removed)> writes
>
>"Robert Sneddon" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
>news(E-Mail Removed)...
>> I'm new to wireless networking. I'm trying to use an older laptop with
>> a Belkin F5D7010 CardBus wireless card (802.11b) under Windows 2000 to
>> connect to a classroom wireless LAN which uses WPA authentication and
>> encryption.
>
>You don;t say which varient of WPA.......

I think it's 256-bit. The class supervisor says the alpha key for
access to the router is a 23-character string. As I said I'm pretty new
to wireless networking but I'm aware that WEP (which does work under
W2k) isn't safe and the classroom router doesn't accept it.

>> To reply, my gmail address is nojay1 Robert Sneddon
>
>Please don't expect e-mail replies, its considered rude...

I'm not expecting email replies but the address in my headers is a
spamtrap (a legal one, a honeypot used for collecting spam for
analysis). Someone who just hits <R> to email me will not get through to
me.
--
To reply, my gmail address is nojay1 Robert Sneddon