GearWERKZ TechBlog

I don't really like working on other peoples' computers. A buddy once told me that once I started on working on everyone's computer in my "family", then I would be doing it forever. At the time, I refused to believe him, thinking that the situation could be managed. There are now a handful of machines that I administer that are not exclusively within my realm of control. Right now, it does not seem that much will go awry. But after this weekend, I have reason to question just how much of myself I can pour into trying to figure something out.

Follow up:

The issue stems partially from the fact that my girlfriend and I do not have a wireless router installed at her place. While it would enhance my ability to work greatly when I am there, I fear that there will be some goofy configuration that Verizon (her DSL provider) has set on the modem that I will have to figure out in order to pair it with a router. Additionally, I also fear that if there is a problem with internet connectivity when I am not there, then we will have the router as an additional variable. And few things are more frustrating than trying to troubleshoot a network problem over the phone. Right now if there is a problem with internet connectivity, we predominantly know that it is Verizon and/or their modem.

But since I have been working from her place one day a week for the last month, and the room where the modem is located is not configured for a full day's work, I have been setting her laptop up to share out its wired internet connection. Then I set up an ad-hoc wireless network for me to tap off of remotely. I typically have two laptops over the Friday workday + weekend trips; my HP 2730p for the Friday workday, and then one of the other laptops that I use for my hobby-stuff. For all of these machines, the ad-hoc network works perfectly and I have had no problems staying connected to the internet.

A couple of weeks ago, we gave her mother the laptop we had re-installed and set up for her; my GF's previous Dell. Her parents were staying with us for the weekend, so I wanted her mom to be able to access the internet while she was there for the two days. This was the first instance where I ran into a problem. The older laptop was not able to stay connected consistently while I had the ad-hoc wireless network set up for WPA2 authentication. The only other option available from my GF's current laptop (my old COMPAL IFL-90 running WinVista 32-bit) was WEP. Re-establishing the ad-hoc on WEP improved the Dell's ability to remain online, but there were still periodic problems.

This past weekend, the same thing occurred. Her youngest sister has a 2007 era MacBook that did not support the WPA2 protocol. It did supported WPA and WEP. Since the ad-hoc was still functioning on WEP, I set the MacBook up for it. It remained connected the first day, but on day 2, I struggled with it for the better part of an hour to get it going again. During this time my HP 2730p and my MacBook Pro (circa February 2008) were always able to connect to the internet. The sister's MacBook could almost always access the ad-hoc, but could not gain access to the internet.

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