Hi all;

One of our PC's can "see" the router but will not connect. But the router cannot "see" the PC, as I can determine what is going on by going into the router utilities from another PC. I've tried changing wireless cards and the same result happens. The wireless card is a Linksys Wireless B WMP11. The router is D-Link WBR 2310. I know I'm using the right access code as it's the same for all PC's. Any ideas?

Harry

i'm certainly no expert but i think i have heard that some wireless network devices use different encyption standards eg. WEP etc. The two wireless devices that speak to eachother need to be compatible to the same encryption type

The default in SP2 is both the wireless router and the all the wireless adapters you want to connect to it must use an encryption key. Otherwise, you may be able to see wireless devices are there, but you can't connect to Secured ones unless you use a key.
If you run the wireless network Setup Wizard in Windows you can have it assign a key automatically or you can specify one.
Windows shows asterisks for that by default - if you have it make a floppy the key is in plain text in one of the files.

For some cheaper wireless adapters that can't be done with Windows - you must install and use a utility that came with the adapter on it's CD and set it up with that.

Once you know the key, or if the router already has a key entered, the key can be entered in the router's configuration, or if it already has one, the key is not hidden with asterisks in the router's configuration.

There are also other requirements -
If any of these are not right you may not see a wireless adaptetr at all....
- the SSID must be the same for all
- the Workgroup name must be the same for all
Whenever you run the network setup wizard in XP, it will reset the Workgroup name to MSHOME - if that's not your workgroup name, you need to change it to what it is.
- the wireless channel must be the same - the default is usually 6. Some software urges you to change that to something else.
- etc.
.......

You should be able to get into the router's configuration by using it's specified http://192.168.xxx.xxx URL in your internet browser, and the default user name - usually there is no password intially.
However, I have seen that some added on search engine browser plugins do not allow you to do that - you get http://www.192.168.xxx.xxx instead and that does not work. You have to disable or turn off the plug in to get that to work.
The internet connection is not required to do that - the router only needs to be connected to the computer through a wired cable or a wireless connection.
It's straight forward if it's a wired connection.

I recommend you use a wired connection to the router for at least one of your computers - it will connect faster than wireless G, and the internet connection will be rock solid reliable.

I also recommend you use a wired connection when setting it's configuration initially.

Stupid thing is one wireless connection works fine, two other wireless can see the router but won't connect.

I disabled the firewall and tried Network Magic. It can still see the network but can't connect. Any ideas?

Harry

Finally figured it out. The key was set to "Open" when it should have been set to "Shared."

Harry