Intermittant Network Issue-again, again, again.....
This is not the usual helpme helpme why does my wireless keep dropping out? Read on and you will understand that it has turned into a part-time job for me dealing with this one issue for a year and a half, so this is more about advice than technical help. I gave up trying to fix it and came up with a better solution. Microsoft is too big and has too many other problems to worry about my frustration. Since January '07 I've experienced the same dropping the network problem that everyone is complaining about on my Desktop PC and my Laptop. I have a vintage PC with Windows Me hardwired to the Wireless A.P. (Ethernet) that has NEVER failed once. I have a Mac-mini with Airport Express (wireless) that has never lost the Internet even once, and hooks up almost immediately upon boot up. Four different machines, four different O/S with different hardware and only Vista and Windows 7 RC Build 7100 O/S have any problem. On the Vista Desktop (Intel Motherboard with Intel CPU) I have tried 4 different Wireless Adapters. I have tried 4 completely different Wireless A.P.'s 1 TrendNet which mostly worked until I gave it away, 2 Linksys, 1 NetGear which mostly didn't (Expensive). Installing Vista and Windows 7 RC 7100 (have tried both O/S on both the Laptop and Desktop, makes no difference) can't be made to work. I tried dropping the security off the A.P. Open Network, or use WEP with a dinky little Passwd, it would work for a week or two. As soon as I try to use WPA or WPA2 the problem starts bigtime. The Mac (Wireless) and my wife's vintage Me (Ethernet) machines never failed under any conditions! They worked flawlessly regardless of which A.P. was running immediately upon bootup. The old PC circa 1983 (800 GHZ CPU) is soooo much faster than my Core 2 Duo Intel PC 6400 with Vista. Vista O/S is almost 20x larger than Windows Me. Forget Motherboards and CPU and Hardware, its Windows, almost exclusively Vista. Though Windows 7, might just be the best work Microsoft has done so far, it's really just Vista 2.0 (2.7)?! What Vista should have been in the first place! My guess is the problem is probably a result of changes made to increase network security newly introduced with Vista. Windows Me and Mac OSX developers weren't, aren't, bothered with the huge overriding Security problem that Microsoft is forced to deal with. This single problem has caused me so much time and grief that I have switched over to Mac. I run Windows XP in a VM inside the Mac and all my problems have disappeared! Win 7 also runs without a single problem on the Mac. I have never before experienced Windows this good! Windows 7 is a good O/S and Microsoft is hoping that we will all forget Vista! Microsoft has taken the hint from people like me running Windows on a Mac and is going to install a feature in Win7 where you can run XP inside of Win7! This is a great idea and a good reason for diehard (but wiser than me) MS holdouts to wait until October for Windows 7. If MS could have done that 2 years ago they would have avoided one of the greatest Marketing Fiascos of all time.
July 20th, 2009 9:08am