It just randomly drops the wireless connection. If I disable then enable the realtek internal adapter in dev manager it usually reconnects but it happens so often that I'm about to shoot the dang thing. I actually put a shortcut to dev man up I do it so often. Sometimes just selecting diagnose and repair does the trick also. Usually diagnose and repair gets me limited connectivity, the device man. solves the whole thing.
Why it turns off the adapter is a mystery. I have never seen a day go by without it happening, sometimes every few minutes. Makes backing up to the NAS impossible.
Just as a test I stuck in a really cheap Zonet usb wireless adapter and it worked for a long time without dropping off the network. No drivers needed or anything it just worked for several weeks with no probs and it isn't even "Vista Certified". But now Vista has stopped recognizing the usb adapter, which may have failed on it own as its internal led no longer lights up at all. The usb ports on this are above a set of vents and anything there gets super hot. But all the usb ports (there is a third on a cooler area) have issues with whatever USB device is there anyway. Printers, wireless mice, sd readers....
I shouldn't have to use an external adapter, two other XP laptops connect fine with rarely any issues. So what the heck is up with Vista?
A few of the things I have been told to do: A friend suggested that my Linksys wrt54g was not playing nice so I should buy a new router, another wants to write a script to reconnect the laptop when it senses a loss of connectivity, an online guide had instructions to modify some settings on the router (crashing it immediately) etc...
Any consensus on what is going on? Or maybe someone wants a good deal on a barely used laptop
Thanks,
Drew
