Comments on: If It’s Not One Thing…

By: Trent

Trent — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 21:59:46 +0000

Good suggestions, but I tried that too, Phil. Right now ye ol’ system is pretty much wide open, but the only computers that rely on that connection are off most of the time and don’t contain any real sensitive info. Both are also backed up, so in case they get hacked and corrupted, I can blow away the OS and start over.

Good point about the OS version too. One is on XP, which should be fine, but the other is on Windows 2K. Both currently suffer from the same problem so it’s not the OS (alone) that’s causing it, but I hadn’t considered that buying the latest and greatest card might lead to new problems due to incompatibility.

I do know that a cable plugged into the back of the computer is secure and, most important of all, it works! I’m sure there are a number of good solutions, but the cheapest is running a longer cable. The others are going to part me with a couple hundred bucks if not more…

By: Dr. Phil

Dr. Phil — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 20:33:45 +0000

Try to use the new router in the old mode and keep the encryption to something like 40-bit — don’t try 128-bit, which was non-standard in the old mode. Sure, it’s less secure, but it doesn’t have a Kick Me sign on it like a wide open unit. Alternately, screw the old cards and join the 21st century. If you get new cards, make sure they work with whatever OS the old machines are working under. (grin)

Dr. Phil

By: Trent Hergenrader

Trent Hergenrader — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 01:32:44 +0000

Zeus, that’s the new plan. Fiddling with firewalls didn’t work.

Phil, you hit the nail on the head: my old cards are WEP and whatever the new fangled Wi-Fi security protocol is, they reject it.

By: Zeus

Zeus — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 22:47:05 +0000

Can’t you just get a longer cord?

By: Dr. Phil

Dr. Phil — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 04:44:09 +0000

Yeah, multiple firewalls are deadly. And old Wi-Fi uses the less secure of the WEP/WAP duo, but a lot of cards and routers had made non-standard implimentations of 128-bit and 80-bit encryption, whereas the original old standard was like only 40-bit. At one point I had to have two Wi-Fi stations running, one for the older machines and one for the newer. The old cards won’t talk to the new routers and the new routers won’t use the old standards properly.

Wonderful.

Dr. Phil

By: Trent Hergenrader

Trent Hergenrader — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 14:26:09 +0000

Thanks Sarah, I’ll give that a try.

By: Sarah

Sarah — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 13:48:32 +0000

Do you have two different firewalls running (i.e. the router and Firefox)? If so, you should disable one, probably the Firefox one (or whatever provider you are using). That happened to me when I got my new Mclappy.