Computer Help Please, Network Issue

[Japher]

Wifey got a new laptop, so we inter the MAC address into the wireless router (as we have done with countless other laptops) and that computer won't connect.

We've tried rebooting the computers, nothing.

I've looked around on the interweb, nothing.

The neighbors have the same computer and we got them a new router, and their's works fine. Could our router be the problem?

The laptop runs Vista, and that scares me.

Any ideas? Questions?

[Pekka]

Check out your configurations. Both, on the laptop and the router.

[reds4ever]

format c:

[Japher]

I was able to get on my neighbors internet, so it's obviously my computer/router... but what?

[Nikolai]

How can you get problems with Vista? I never have to anything but connect and choose what kind of network it is with Vista.

[Japher]

It's obviously my router... but the Netgear site doesn't want to admit it.

[Nikolai]

Kick it.

[snoopy369]

Do you have two way validation, e.g. do you validate with a WEP key or whatnot going the other way in addition to the MAC validation? Maybe the WEP key is wrong?

Otherwise i'd assume you had the MAC address wrong either mistyped or misread it. Only other possibility I can think of is some sort of incompatibility between router and wireless card, you could try googling the names together with "can't connect" in quotes and see what happens...

[Japher]

I entered both the "MAC" and the "LAN wireless" into the access fields on the router and it works now, but the older laptop can't access the network now... Really weird.

[snoopy369]

Eh, I don't like using MAC validation for this reason - sometimes it can be iffy (the software, not the validation). It is technically more secure than WEP encryption but ... meh, WEP is strong enough if you don't use something dumb like 0000000000 as the key, and it's a lot more consistent in its behavior.

[Lonestar]

Did you try swearing at it?