Wireless network connection doesn't exist...?

Question

So please bear with me, I'm slightly computer illiterate.  My roommate disabled her wireless in an attempt to try to make it work with our new router.  I finally figured out how to enable it using vista (I have xp) by going into 'manage network connections', because she is new to vista and we couldn't even find that, but the problem is that for some reason, she doesn't have a wireless connection for me to enable anymore, only a local area connection.  I can't really enable it if it's not there to be enabled, if I'm understanding this correctly.  I dug around and if this is relevant, her driver for her network adapter is NVIDIA; I updated it, but still nothing.  What do I need to do?

Answer 1

Hi Kayci

Is the System Restore turned on or off?

If the System Restore is not functioning properly, you may need to run a System File Check and/or do a "repair" on Windows Vista

http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/Help/5c59f8c1-b0d1-4f1a-af55-74f3922f3f351033.mspx#EX

Please Post back and let us know if this helped to resolve the issue.

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Ken

Microsoft Answers Support Engineer

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Answer 2

first and foremost, is the machine able to boot to a normal desktop???

if not, then you need to find a computer savvy person or computer repair facility of considerable reputation (best buy geek squad is one i HIGHLY recommend) and have them either restore the machine or wipe the drives and load a fresh install of her operating system.

if you can load to a normal desktop, then you need to goto an internet-ready computer with a CD burner and goto http://www.belarc.com/free\_download.html  download this software!! its free it works!!!! burn it to a CD, install it on her PC

install it!! run it!!! it will tell you darn near everything about the machine!! just follow the left hand collumn till u find COMMUNICATIONS and it will list any modem or NIC (Network Interface Card) on her machine like say.. "3com EtherLink XL10/100 PCI TX NIC  or Belkin Wireless G PCI Adapter ETC!!!!  once you find the specific card you have, simply GOOGLE "drivers for (whatever the card is) and 9x outta 10x, you will be able to find the manufacturers drivers for said NIC and once installed properly, should be able to access your router and internet.

i wish there was a microsoft fix, BUT, microsoft is full of software people and software people dont fix hardware. and as any hardware guy will tell ya, microsoft software is far from the best at determining hardware failures

Answer 3

Thanks for your quick reply!  So it took me forever to figure out how to even access system restore because her computer is different from the system cited in that link; I had to search it and click on a link that Windows Help and Support gave me to open it!  When I finally found it, I got this message

"System Restore does not appear to be functioning correctly on this system.  The Volume Shadow Copy service used by System Restore is not working.  For more information view the event log. (0x81000202)"

What can I do about this predicament? 

I'm starting to think maybe she just doesn't need to be able to access the internet.  In fact, she doesn't need a computer at all, that's kind of my feelings at this point!

Answer 4

Hi Kayci,

Thanks for using the Answers Forum.

So far, so good.

I'm not aware of a network card that NVidia makes, they normally manufacture video cards.

This could be why the wireless adapter isn't working.

You might try a System Restore, which really only restores Vista settings, it won't touch her personal files or programs.

Here's how:

http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/windows/en-us/help/9f6d755a-74bb-4a7d-a625-d762dd8e79e51033.mspx

Looking forward to hearing back from you.

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Chris

Microsoft Answers Support Engineer

Visit our Microsoft Answers Feedback Forum and let us know what you think.