A little friendly router advice?

[breadandbubbles]

my friend and his mom moved across the city last week.

my friend has a new laptop himself, sporting windows vista. i dont know which version. his mom, though, has a desktop pc running windows xp, and it has a usb wireless device she keeps plugged in at all times.

i went over to set up her PC for her. for various reasons they needed to get a new wireless router. they got a brand new Linksys WRT54G (one of my faves). they didnt wnat file sharing or anything, so i juse hooked up the router to their cable modem, set up a WPA 2 encryption, and away we go.

my friends laptop picked it up fine. great connection all over the house.

but for some frusterating reason that desktop pc cant even see the network. says there no network in range when i use the standard windows wireless connection window. i tried changing the encryption to WPA, then taking it off entirely.

she really needs her computer for her job (she works from home), and i have no idea what to do. she packed up her pc, unpacked it, and now the wireless doesnt work. im getting indications that the usb wireless stick DOES work, because theres that wireless icon in the tray. and it worked the day before. she didnt install/uninstall anything.

tommorrow im going to bring a Dlink 624 over, and another newer dlink i have. the 1310, i think? just to see if theres some incompatibilities with the usb device and the linksys router. i'll also try throwing the stcik onto my friends laptop, to see if the device works from there (which i really dont wnat to do. especillay since his laptop is vista, and i HATE dealing with vista..)

i just wanted to know if there were any suggestions. i have no idea what to do here. ive never seen this before, and i cant seem to phrase my googling right because im not finding any leads.

[Tarun]

Check and see what version firmware the router has. Linksys WRT54G's are good, but the best are WRT54GL's or the WRT54G1-4. If it fits one of those, load Tomato Firmware on it and you'll most likely never have any problems with it again.

[Gaphrum]

The xp machine does not support wpa2. You need to install it.

Update for Windows XP (KB893357)

Brief Description

This update to Windows XP provides support for Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2), which is the latest standards-based wireless security solution derived from the IEEE 802.11i standard.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...;displaylang=en

[nmX.Memnoch]

You should also install KB917021 after installing KB893357.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...;DisplayLang=en

Brief Description

Install this update to enhance the Windows XP support for Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2) options in Wireless Group Policy (WGP), and to help prevent the Windows wireless client from advertising the wireless networks in its preferred networks list.

[puntoMX]

Check and see what version firmware the router has. Linksys WRT54G's are good, but the best are WRT54GL's or the WRT54G1-4. If it fits one of those, load Tomato Firmware on it and you'll most likely never have any problems with it again.

Wait to flash that router until everything works! It will void your warranty IF you flash it with a non LinkSYS firmware (just to inform).

Gaphrum, welcome to the forum, and good info!

nmX.Memnoch, thank you for your link too.

Moving this to a more appropriate forum part.

[breadandbubbles]

alright, those are good suggestions, and i'll surely give them a shot.

i dont know if you noticed though, that i disabled all encryption on the nwtowrk. i figured there was something about the WPA 2 that wasnt working, so i took off all encryption, not even WEP.

and it STILL didnt detect the network.

so now i dont know WHAT to do.

do you think its her security software. unfortunately, she has norton internet security.

[nmX.Memnoch]

You also need to check the wireless mode and what her wireless adapter supports. If you have the router set to 'G-Only' and her adapter is only 802.11b then she won't get a connection. Aside from that, these are the settings I usually use:

Security Mode: WPA2 Personal

WPA Algorithms: AES (you can try TKIP+AES...if that works, use it)

WPA Shared Key: <make up your own >

Group key Renewal: 3600 seconds (default)

Note that if her adapter is 802.11b only, chances are it won't support WPA2. A temporary fix would be to put the router in Mixed wireless mode and use WPA. Then I would suggest that she get an updated adapter.

Of course, the first thing I should've asked was how close is her desktop to the router? Is a wired connection not possible? I personally prefer to put my desktop machines on wired connections.

Edited April 10, 2008 by nmX.Memnoch