Preparing to be embarrassed, again!

macman

Sorry codger, I meant earlier posts. There's lots. Search and ye will find...

tomsutton529

ive had a quick read of the thread and i cant see anyone sugesting to see where on the network the problem could be... personaly i would ping the router and hope for a reply, if no reply then you know its between the PC and router, a reply means its likely to be AOL and not you. however rebooting the router never does any harm.

we could go onestep further and tr tracert to an address like google.com but i often find that a ping will do.

when i get home il check this thread and have a proper look.

Baldur

tomsutton529 wrote: »

ive had a quick read of the thread and i cant see anyone sugesting to see where on the network the problem could be... personaly i would ping the router and hope for a reply, if no reply then you know its between the PC and router, a reply means its likely to be AOL and not you. however rebooting the router never does any harm.

we could go onestep further and tr tracert to an address like google.com but i often find that a ping will do.

when i get home il check this thread and have a proper look.

From the OP, the AOL connection problem had been resolved prior to posting.

tomsutton529

Baldur wrote: »

From the OP, the AOL connection problem had been resolved prior to posting.

to save me some reading and a possible fix now, what is the problmes with the network?

old_codger1

Jake'sGran wrote: »

I'd give anything to be as witty as you AND you are an old codger too!

What can I say... it's a gift

Anyhooo... I've found that people understand things better if they have an 'overview', (to use a phrase I don't particularly like), of the problem. Otherwise they just get confused with a series of 'press this, 'push that' instructions with no rhyme or reason as to why they're doing them.

Jake'sGran wrote: »

The adapter I attached is exactly the same as the picture you included and I will be taking it back. As some people on this forum will know I have a laptop downstairs which is wireless and the desktop is upstairs next to the printer. After I take back the adapter to the nice man in ASDA I will have a rethink as I don't think I am wise/experienced enough to be trying to sort this out.

On the contrary, if you've got your laptop working and connected to a wireless broadband router for internet connection you've done very well... very well indeed

OK! So it seems you just want to connect up another computer to the same network. If I'm correct the computer you want to connect isn't near enough to router to plug in with a network cable. Please confirm

If that's right then, as you've correctly identified, you needed a wireless network connection and, (by the looks of your recent posts), the problem was just that the one you bought couldn't get a strong enough signal. There's a number of options. The simplest being another type of USB wireless network stick.

I've used a Belkin one before now, like this...



As you can see, this has a cable with it that allows you to move the stick away from the back or front of the PC where all the electrical interference is. In fact, you can just buy a normal USB wireless network stick, (the one you've got might be OK in this case), and a USB extension cable which will achieve the same result.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/78902

Or, a someone else said, you can buy a PCI wireless card but that would have to be installed inside the machine. TBH I'd try the first option before looking at this because that can get a bit difficult and means taking the top, back or side off your machine and fiddling around inside.

Bear in mind, whatever you do, you'll have to set the network card up the same way you did with your laptop wireless connection, i.e. entering wireless encryption keys and so on. If you've already done that you should know more or less what you're aiming for but you might need to check back here again.

Of course, as you say, if you do install a network connection in your desktop you can then connect up the 2 PC's and print to PC with the printer attached and even access the hard disk of one from the other. Again, that needs to be set up properly and, most importantly, securely.

bluboy

tomsutton529 wrote: »

to save me some reading and a possible fix now, what is the problmes with the network?

Just to sum up for the late arrivals (JakesGran - please correct me if I'm wrong!) -

AOL Wireless Router upstairs
Desktop PC upstairs - but not currently connected to the router (no ethernet port) - has bought new usb wireless adaptor which isn't working very well
Printer upstairs - connected to Desktop PC
Laptop downstairs - connecting wirelessly to the router and the internet okay

The Trend USB dongle appears to be installed on the Desktop PC okay but is likely to be a bit slower than hoped for as its connected to a USB 1.0 port.


So JakesGran, now that the AOL isue is resolved, have you had any more joy with the Desktop PC and the new USB dongle?
I'm not sure whether the AOL problem also made it look like your new USB dongle wasn't working.

By the way, which version of Windows do you have on the Desktop PC? (Win 98, XP?)

macman

The Trend dongle says in the specs that it requires USB 2. Are we then confident that it will still work on Gran's USB 1.0 system then (albeit rather slower)?
PS: once this is sorted, I think Gran would appreciate being able to print across the network, i.e. type a letter on the laptop and then send to the printer upstairs (saves all that transferring to flash drive stuff)...

bluboy

macman wrote: »

The Trend dongle says in the specs that it requires USB 2. Are we confident that it will still work on Gran's USB 1.0 system then (albeit rather slower)?

Are we reading the same spec?...

http://www.trendnet.com/products/proddetail.asp?prod=265_TEW-424UB&cat=84

Interface - USB 2.0, 1.1, 1.0 Compliant

macman

I missed that-just saw USB 2.0 on the first page...
So in that case why can't Gran get this working? Everything else is in place (we think).

old_codger1

macman wrote: »

I missed that-just saw USB 2.0 on the first page...
So in that case why can't Gran get this working? Everything else is in place (we think).

Maybe this has more to do with AOL?

I use Tiscali and they assume you have technical knowledge yourself, (or did when I first started suing them, at any rate), so don't really provide much in the way of help. One thing about that, though, is that at least you can configure it the way you want because.... well, you've GOT to configure it yourself.

I seem to remember being told that AOL like to hold your hand with this stuff so maybe OP hasn't followed the same route setting up the wireless stuff thinking she's already done it?

Of course, she'll have to follow many of the same steps in setting up the new connection including entering encryption codes and selecting which router to connect to.

There's also the matter of the signal strength as she's already mentioned...

I have just been fiddling about again with the adapter and the messages on different screens were indicating weak signals etc.

Of course, on the other hand, maybe AOL set up their routers to only allow connections from wireless conections that are registered using some configuration software she's meant to install, (and has done on her laptop), and it's nothing to do with signal strength?

Dunno!