HI; there I had some problems on my p4 256mb window xp professional edition recently. Since I installed Netgear pre-n wg 511 wireless card on laptop, it almost everytime there is a little ball wonder around on little computer icon on right bottom corner with message said: Acquired networking address! I did everything to solve this problem, turned off fire wall,ping127.0..0.1,ipconfig /all, ipconfig /release,/renew and manully assigned ip address,but it just did not work.Its seem like connect to networking,but it don't have internet access!!!!! However, I found out in Netgear properties at support section, I see assigned by DHCP: invaild ip address. Although I shared wireless with roomate who has wire networking direct hooked up on that router, my roomate works fine but me! I need some urgent help! thank you in advance!

windows XP will not connect to a unsecure network without you telling it to. double click the network icon on the taskbar and select connect to network. Their should be a seeting there or a pop up warning about connecting to a unsecure network. If you set up WEP encryptyion in the router then you will need to enter in the encryption key in the wireless connection.

You have not mentioned if there is a wireless router in the setup. Without it you can connect to nothing locally without a wire. Maybe a neighbor has wireless and you might be able to catch their signal. (I must be reading your post wrong as it surely is a wireless router your roomate is connected to, no?) Bryan

HI: there I did to enter WEP encryption key in proper field,then I click apply and connect button.it semms like working very fine,but it coudl not connect to internet with acquire networking address message shown in bottom of right hand corner! the problem is how DHCP assigned invalid IP address? I have automaitic private address which is 169.254.0.0, its good! i don' know hwat is going on? thank you in advance!