Thinkpads Forum

I picked up a Netgear WG511 and got it running with my network at home, but one thing. It is very fussy about Plug and Play.

If you don't to a "Safely Remove Hardware" before pulling the card, it will hose the driver next time the card is inserted. Then you have to remove the driver and reinstall.. (up to 6 reinstalls now....)

(I've tried drivers version 1.1, 1.6, and 2.7)

any ideas?
Tim

Hello Tradbourne,

With WG511, if you don't have administrator privilege, you cannot save profiles in Netgear configuration. The best thing is to use Windows configuration (you can use wpa)... This card works very well with your Thinkpad.

Thanks for the feedback AcePro

I do have administrator rights and I am not using IBM Access Connection software. Only straight Windows and Netgear?

Which version of the WG511 driver are you using?

What happens when you pull the card from your laptop without doing a "Safely Remove Hardware" first?

When I do this, the laptop gives the standard tone that recognizes a removed device, but when I plug the card back in, it claims it is new hardware and needs to install drivers all over again. When this happens, I have deinstall the old drivers and reinstall them again before the card will work.

puzzled......
Tim

With administrator rights, I prefer to use Netgear client. Without administrator rights, to save profiles, you can only use Windows configuration. Netgear drivers always need to be installed: actually v2.9. But 1.6 or 2.7 were allright too.
One important thing is to remove correctly the oldest driver, and the Netgear uninstaller works well. With version 2.9 you can use wpa.

I don't use "Safely Remove Harware" (There is no icon for that in my XP system). I just plug out the card when there is no activity. When I plug the card in again, the connection works perfectly, the connection is stable.

To uninstall completely the drivers, I use the Netgear uninstaller. After that, I load regedit and I delete the wireless connection sub-keys under

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network\{4D36E972-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}

(It is not necessary to delete the sub-keys in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet00X\). I reboot the computer, and install the drivers following Netgear's recommandations. And I create different profiles (Home, Work,...), with Netgear or Windows client utility and save them: SSID, wpa,... . You don't need to upgrade the firmware's card, it is loaded with the drivers.

I hope you understand my frenchy english !

Thanks, I'll try your suggestion and see if it clears up the problems.

Tim