[aaaa44]

My landlord has wifi for all the apartment units. I just installed a new motherboard and memory in my computer myself and got the computer running fine, but I can't figure out how to connect to the internet. There is an icon in the system tray that says "Local area connection 2. A network cable is unplugged". I have never used wifi before. I was using DSL before now. The antennae is marked "Trendnet TEW-645UB", and I have it plugged into its base and the usb plug connected firmly to my pc and have tried different usb ports. When I started up my pc for the first time after installing the new hardware I got messages from I believe my Comodo firewall warning that "Realtek.exe" or something like that was trying to install programs. Since Realtek is not the name on the wifi antennae I chose to not allow the programs to install. I turned off Avast, Comodo, and the Windows security and tried to connect to the internet to see if they were blocking something, but I still couldn't get on the internet. When I go into control panel there are several Realtek program icons shown. I have XP Home on my computer and use Avast scanner version 5.0.462 and Comodo firewall version 3.13.121240.574. I'm sure these are outdated because my computer has been in storage for a long time. Sorry about the probable misuse of nomenclature, but like I said this is the first time I'm dealing with wifi. Thanks for any replies.

[Ztruker]

Local area connection 2 is your Ethernet (wired) connection, not your wireless.

Open Device Manager, expand Network Adapters and see if there are any yellow marks. If not, what devices are shown there? It's quite possible that Realtek is your wireless device, but Device Manager will show you.

To open device manager, click on Start then Run, type devmgmt.msc and press Enter.

[aaaa44]

When I go into device manager there are "Network Adaptor" which has listed under it "Realtek PCIe GBE Family Controller" and "Other devices" which has listed under it "802.11 n WLAN". Both "Other devices" and "802.11 n WLAN" have yellow question marks in front of them. The only other yellow icon is an exclamation point at the very bottom of the list of programs in front of "unknown device". I double clicked "802.11 n WLAN" and a window came up saying "reinstal driver" under the properties tab. Then the window "Welcome to the update wizard" window, and I chose to install automatically. Then another window that said "The wizard could not find the software on your computer for 802.11 n WLAN. It's recommended that you connect to the internet". When I double clicked the "Realtek PCIe GBE...." icon a window came up saying the it's working properly. I reinstalled all of these from the ASUS mb support cd: "Intel Chipset Inf Update", "Realtek Audio Driver", "Realtek LAN Driver", "Intel Graphics Accelerator". Since I am using an antennae I am not using an ethernet connection but a wifi connection, so the fact that the computer says that a LAN 2 is not connected is okay, correct? I plugged the antennae base in every usb port in the back of my computer but none made any difference. I did get to a window at some point where I typed in the code for the wifi connection. If the wifi is working fine, how do I connect to the internet? Would there be an icon on my desktop that I double click to connect, or can I double click the IE or Firefox icons to connect which I have been trying? Thanks for any replies.

[Ztruker]

Sounds like you need to install the driver for the wireless (WLAN) device embedded on the new mother board. There may be a wireless driver or maybe the chipset driver will handle it.

What is the make and model number of the new mother board?

[aaaa44]

ASUS P5G41T-M LX PLUS Intel G41 Motherboard - Micro ATX, Intel G41 Express, Socket LGA775, 1333MHZ DDR3 (O.C.), SATA II (3.0Gb/s), 8-CH Audio, Gigabit LAN, USB 2.0

[Ztruker]

Download the network drivers from here: Support For Motherboard P5G41T-M LX PLUS

Select your Operating System (OS) then download the Chipset and LAN drivers and install them, see if that fixes the problem.

[Ztruker]

Constance83, ????? What does your post mean? Makes no sense at all.

[wannabe1]

She's a spammer, Rich. I'll delete her posts....

[aaaa44]

I downloaded the chipset and LAN drivers onto a flash drive from the site you recommended. I right clicked on the drivers files downloaded onto my flash drive, chose extract all and went through the installation process. Now there's an "Intel chipset" folder, a "Realtek LAN" folder, and a "flash files" folder listed on the flash drive. In control panel the programs "REALTEK GbE and FE Ethernet PCI-ENIC driver" and "Realtek High Definition Audio Driver" are listed with contents in the right hand "size" column, but the "VIA Platform Device Manager" and "VIA Rhine-Family Fast Ethernet Adaptor" programs are blank in the right hand size column. Was I supposed to copy the flash drive contents onto the C drive then extract and install the drivers from the C drive? How do I connect to the internet, with IE or Firefox or should there be a new wireless icon to double click? When I double click either the IE or Firefox icon the computer will not connect to the internet.

[Ztruker]

What does Device Manager look like now? Are there still any yellow marks? If so, where?

Not sure where my head was but you told me you had a USB Wireless device and I blipped right over it. There is no "built-in" wireless.

Did you install the driver for the Trendnet TEW-645UB USB network adapter? It should have come with a CD. All the drivers and the manual are here: Trendnet Downloads - Wireless

[Troy]

You have said that you didn't allow an installation from Realtek. It's possibly the Trendnet adapter uses a Realtek chip - so you'll have to allow this. You might need to enter your Comodo firewall settings and remove it from being blocked before it will allow you to install again.

[aaaa44]

Under Device Manager there are yellow question marks to the left of "other devices" and "802.11nWLAN". At the bottom of the list there is a yellow exclamation point to the left of "unknown device". In Comodo under "DEFENSE +" "Application" There are eight "C:\WINDOWS\RTHDCPL.EXE\" listed on the left with the date 4/12/12 to the right. There is nothing new under "view firewall events" or "my blocked files".

I just downloaded the driver for the Trendnet TEW-645UB USB network adapter onto my flash drive and will install it tonight. Thanks.

[Troy]

Let us know the results... good or bad.

[aaaa44]

I found the Trendnet cd and installed the utility. I also downloaded the Trendnet utility from the site you recommended and installed from there earlier. I then connected the antennae to the usb port as the instructions said. The quick install guide on the utility cd said that after connecting the antennae to the usb port that these messages would come up: "Found new hardware wizard" then "Install the software automatically" then double click on the wireless client utility in the system tray then "site survey" is supposed to come up then in "site survey" I am supposed to select "ssid". None of these messages came up even when I restarted the computer with the antennae connected to the usb port. I tried a few different usb ports. When I double click on the wireless client utility in the system tray this message comes up: "802.11 Wireless client utility" and under this in the same window: "The adapter is not present" and "ok" beneath that. This same "802.11 Wireless client utility" message pops up everytime I start my computer. Since the message "Found new hardware" never pops up and the "802.11 wireless client utility, the adapter is not present" does pop up does that mean the antennae is bad?

[Troy]

It's possible. Are you able to install it on another computer OK?