Question re: wireless networking

[Patti]

I just brought home a new laptop with onboard wireless port and for the most
part it is working fine but it drops the wireless connection fairly
regularly (like once an hour). I'm trying to determine if it is my wireless
router, ISP service in general or something not right on the laptop itself.
It's XP SP2, the Windows firewall is disabled and I am running CA firewall.
When it decides to drop the connection I can actually see the balloon come
up "Disconnected" and if I wait a few minutes it will reconnect. When it
drops connection, I can ping the loopback IP and the IP used by the laptop
but I can't ping my router. I have not seen the same problem on any of the
other computers (also wireless) in the house so I am suspecting the laptop
but I don't use them all that much. What kinds of things should I be
checking?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Patti]

More info...
I had a spare wireless NIC so I installed it and its driver into the laptop
and disabled the onboard wireless NIC but didn't install the vendor's
advanced device management software and had the same issue--- connection
dropping frequently. Then I installed the wireless NIC advanced device
management and turned off the Windows Automatic wireless connection
management and have not had a problem since. I definitely need to let it run
longer to be sure but it looks like something is out of whack with the
out-of-the-box config on the Windows Automatic wireless connection manager.
I have a strong technical background but not in this so I am feeling kind of
lost--- I've checked connection state and speeds (where configurable) and
the basics but no idea what to check next.
Thanks!

 

[NBljid]

I think you are right guys!

 

[Mike Fields]

More info...
I had a spare wireless NIC so I installed it and its driver into the
laptop and disabled the onboard wireless NIC but didn't install the
vendor's advanced device management software and had the same
issue--- connection dropping frequently. Then I installed the wireless
NIC advanced device management and turned off the Windows Automatic
wireless connection management and have not had a problem since. I
definitely need to let it run longer to be sure but it looks like
something is out of whack with the out-of-the-box config on the
Windows Automatic wireless connection manager. I have a strong
technical background but not in this so I am feeling kind of lost---
I've checked connection state and speeds (where configurable) and the
basics but no idea what to check next.
Thanks!

While I don't have the answer, I have seen this question before.
You might want to also ask this question over in the
microsoft.public.windows.networking.wireless
group. It may be an issue of a cordless phone, someone
else using the same channel etc.

mikey

 

[Charlie]

I would suggest you post your question at alt.internet.wireless. They
address these issues all the time. Good luck.