Wifi, and magickal disappearing apps

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mlleangelique

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Hello. I'm Angelique and my Wifi hates me.

So, I've got a new (well, new old) laptop off eBay, which just has Windows XP and Norton Utilities installed. I also bought a Wifi card, installed the software and put it in, and it didn't work. When trying putting it in another laptop it didn't seem to light up or anything, so I concluded it was probably the card.

But the odd thing was: when I tried to load the software that came with it (a 3com utility thing) it briefly appeared, then disappeared and sat in the tray, and refused to reappear for more than a fraction of a second.

Anyway, having decided that was dud, I bought a USB Wifi thing, and after installing it, pretty much the same thing happened, but this one has a little glowing light which seems to show that at least it's responding. It doesn't seem to work, and the software that came with it (this time LM / "ZDWLan") appears for a brief second, then disappears, and claims to exist in Task Manager, but can't be retrieved.

Anyone know what's going on? It'd be nice not to have lots of wires sticking out of this machine...
 
What kinda laptop is it? Brand/Model/Specs? Which version of WinXP? Does it have SP1 or SP2? Do you have wired connection at the house? If so, try using it on wire see if it gets online.
 
I'm posting it from the laptop on a wired connection, so that's fine. It's a Compaq Evo 410c, 1.2Gb, 256Mb RAM, and it seems to be XP Home 2002 with SP2...
 
The router's a BT Voyager 2110 - currently the laptop and a desktop are plugged into it with a cable, and another laptop is using it with no problems for Wifi. There are four or five other wireless networks floating around the area from other houses, too.
 
Have you scanned that laptop with any anti-virus and anti-spyware programs?

First, try WinSockFix: |MG| Free Download - WinSock XP Fix 1.2

Save to desktop. Open it and click "Fix". Let it run and reboot with it. When you're back in Windows, go Start-->Run, at the space type in CMD to bring up the Command Prompt. If you see
C:\Documents and Settings\Your User name> then type cd\ at the end of that line then hit enter, should leave you with a clean C:\ prompt. Now type in ipconfig /flushdns and hit enter. Reboot then try WiFi on it again.
 
According to Norton and Adaware, there's nothing worse than tracking cookies on the laptop. I've just tried the Winsock/flushdns thing, but it doesn't seem to have done anything. :/ It all seems particularly odd given that it came empty apart from the Norton and XP...
 
Oh - hurrah, I have it! I tried emailing myself the drivers from the CD, rather than taking off the Internet, and it seems to work. Yay! Thank you for taking the time to try to help.
 
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