WLAN card gets signal but no IP Address

[Roshan Qureshi]

I have an OEM Orinoco Mini-PCI WLAN card in a Windows 2000 notebook. It
finds the wireless router just fine (SSID is detected; signal is strong (5/5
bars); MAC address of router is detected; there is no security on the
router) but it does not acquire an IP address (yes, it is setup for DHCP).
Here's what I have tried and found:

.. swap cards with a known-good one: same problem.
.. Uninstall card driver & client mgmt. software. Download and install
latest driver/SW from vendor's web site: same problem.
.. Install latest driver/SW from Agere's (chipset maker) website: same
problem.
.. Install another (brand and model) WLAN card in PC Card slot: success!
.. Uninstall/reinstall TCP/IP (Microsoft KB Article 837333): same problem
.. For another, unrelated issue, swapped out the computer shell (everything
except HDD, WLAN card, optical drive, & battery) for a known-good one.
.. Give card a static address: same problem.

Does anyone have any suggestions short of doing a clean reinstall of Windows
(which I'm pretty sure will fix the problem since the hardware seems OK, but
will take a solid day to do)?

Thanks in advance,
roshan

 

[Clark]

You never give the name or model of the router. Have you checked their
website for updates and possibly compatibility problems with that type of
card?

Can you use a different brand router to test? Sometimes words or phrases
used in setting up the cards and/or routers are a little different and don't
always mean the exact same thing.

Clark

 

[Jack \(MVP\)]

Hi

Seems that you did every thing right, might be the card is functional any more.

Since new PCMCIA cards can be found these days for $10 there is no need to “Break you

Heart” because of a piece of plastic.

Jack (MVP-Networking).

 

[Roshan Qureshi]

The router is a Linksys WRT54G. The card, as I mentioned, is an OEM ORiNOCO
Mini-PCI (chipset by Agere). This machine/card has failed acquire an IP
Address (DHCP or static) on multiple routers of different brands & models,
though it always picks up the SSID, channel, &c. This same card, when
installed in another PC of the same model, works fine with this router.

As for words/phrases being different in various client managers, that is a
pet peeve of mine. Since this card detects the router's channel, SSID, and
MAC correctly, I believe that all the wireless-specific settings are
correct.

I suspect that the issue at hand is not specific to wireless networking, but
some other Ethernet/TCP/I-don't-know-what setting for this connectoid on
this machine. Does anyone know how to delete a connectoid and all its
settings (files, registry entries, &c.)? Any other ideas?

thanks,
roshan

 

[Roshan Qureshi]

Thanks, Jack. The card is good; I put it in another machine of the same
model/OS and it works. It's something with this card in this machine . . .

rq

 

[Clark]

Have you seen this?
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;327947

Clark

 

[Clark]

Just something else to keep you busy

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,5354659

http://www.ralphfowler.com/links/Cleaning_Agere_Orinoco_ lucent_ Drivers_out_of_Windows_2000 .html

Someone in one news group mentioned something about a driver that did the
registry hack for you, that was talked about in the previous post.

Clark

 

[Roshan Qureshi]

I have. I experienced this problem when I was running SP3, but I found a
patch (presumably addressing this issue) on the computer vendor's web site
that fixed it. Later, I upgraded to SP4 and the card still worked. [I
don't know if I mentioned this before, but it should now be clear that the
card has worked in the past.]

thanks,
roshan

 

[Roshan Qureshi]

Interesting! I'll try that when the user returns from his current trip &
let you know. Thanks again for all the help and research!

roshan