Laptop wont connect to wireless broadband any more

C

collieb

Registered User
Messages
205
My laptop has been happily connected to the internet for the past year via a Sitecom wireless router and Railink 2250 Wireless card. The other day though it dropped the signal and I haven't been able to get it back. While this has often temporarily happened before, usually if i click on 'repair connection' it restores no problem, or if I put the laptop on standby it will reconnect when i switch it on again. However, none of these tricks have worked this time and I know the wirless signal is fine from the router because i brought along my g/f's laptop yesterday and it connected to the wirless signal without any problem. Just to note that my laptop is not picking up any signal whatsoever and no network is listed when i 'Refresh network list'. Can anyone offer any advice?
 
Hmm. Sounds eerily similar to a problem I have lately-are there LED lights on the network card (one for 'power' and one for 'connected')? Mine has 2, and only the 'power' light is on. Never had a problem with the signal before-the card is a 2 year old Belkin.
 
Is the router SID broadcasting or hidden?
Can you see any other wireless networks to prove your laptops wireless is working?
Have you perhaps deleted the profile for your router?

If youre happy the wireless is working on the laptop, Id suggest using a cat 5 cable, connect directly to the router, then recreate the profile on the laptop.
 
Is your wireless card disabled ? Check in the network control panel for properties of the card and see if it is turned off. Does Windows give you any message when you remove and insert the card ? If not, then perhaps the card is bust.

z
 
Network card manufacturers usually provide some sort of diagnostic tool as a download in case that helps. As zag says some laptops/cards allow the radio to be switched off sometimes in advertently (e.g. Dell laptops have a Fn + radio on/off key combination to do this and I've seen people hit it by accident and then wonder what happened!).

What sort of cards are both of you using? Built-in/mini PCI, USB, PCMCIA/CardBus etc.?
 
I just tried connecting directly to the wireless router using a CAT-5 cable and no joy. When I remove the card from the laptop I get no response from Windows XP when I remove or insert the card. The network adaptor appears to be working correctly....
 
You mean it sounds like the router is not working? Have you power cycled it? And done a hard reset if necessary (this will lose any existing configuration settings so proceed with caution and only if nothing else works).
 
I just tried connecting directly to the wireless router using a CAT-5 cable and no joy. When I remove the card from the laptop I get no response from Windows XP when I remove or insert the card. The network adaptor appears to be working correctly....
Click to expand...

Is this an ISP supplied one or is it one you got yourself and is fed from the ISP supplied one?

Just thinking its a possible DNS issue, if it was you could try setting the IP on your client and getting on to the router that way but you'd want to be comfortable with the steps and with backout, if not, just go with the hard reset.
 
ClubMan said:
You mean it sounds like the router is not working? Have you power cycled it? And done a hard reset if necessary (this will lose any existing configuration settings so proceed with caution and only if nothing else works).
Click to expand...


No, the router is fine as the wireless connection is working fine on my other laptop.

Thanks for the suggestions-I have a more knowledgeable friend who I might get to look at it (I don't really want to mess around with settings etc. as described above myself).
 
ccovich - the 'connected' light is what is normally called a 'link light' - on a wired network it shows there is a physical/electrical link between the card and another device (typically a switch) at the end of the cable.

In wireless terms the link light is normally only active (as far as I remember) when the card has associated (i.e. negotiated a connection with the relevant security parameters) with the AP - it has established a logical link in this case, there is obviously no physical or electrical link between the devices. In light of this, an 'off' link light on a wireless card normally only indicates that the card is not associated with an AP, so it doesn't add much to the diagnostics unfortunately.

collieb - you know the AP is working with the settings you have on record because you could connect your girlfriends laptop to the network. This really only leaves your card/driver/settings as the issue.

z
 
This is only a long shot. My acer has a facility in the power managment where I can turn off the cardbus.I'm not familiar with HP,s power managment.If it has its own power management program have a look in there to see if the cardbus is turned off.Did you try your wireless card in your gf's laptop?
 
ClubMan said:
As zag says some laptops/cards allow the radio to be switched off sometimes in advertently (e.g. Dell laptops have a Fn + radio on/off key combination to do this and I've seen people hit it by accident and then wonder what happened!).
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice folks. I'd love to tell you that i spent hours working on my settings and eventually managed to find some very convoluted and complicated way of getting it working, which obviously demonstrated how au fait i am with computers.

Alas i find i am one of the group referred to above by clubman as i sheepishly admit that i never had a clue that Fn + F1 on a packard bell laptop indeed knocks on/off the wireless signal. But at least i can take solace in knowing that my embarrassment might save others from a similar fate since they won't have to let the whole AAM forum know about it as I did
 
What matters is that you got sorted. Just curious - did you hit the Fn + F1 combination accidently or deliberately (and forgot or something)?
 
ClubMan said:
What matters is that you got sorted. Just curious - did you hit the Fn + F1 combination accidently or deliberately (and forgot or something)?
Click to expand...

It was accidental - I never even realised that the combination even knocked the signal on and off (though the small antenna like symbol on the F1 key should have been a clue) and I'm not even sure now why I would have pressed those two keys in combination anyway!
 
the problem with a belkin wireless connection is a fairly straightforward one to repair. you need to delete all belkin files from the pc and restart the installation. as long as you have all your keys data stored you should be ok.
 
I think you need to be careful with advice like "delete all [Belkin] files" as that is a recipe for a disaster involving somebody who doesn't really know what they're doing.
 
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