Windows 98 and Aironet 350 PCI Card

[JamieBenson]

I have a complicated question and would really appreciate any input anyone has. I have a network with 12 PC's that are running Windows 98 with Novell Netware. They all have Aironet 350 PCI cards in them. We recently decided to change an older PC out and took out it's Aironet card to install in the new PC which is a Dimension 4400. I install the card and the utilities and drivers and I can get the PC associated to the AP. I then install the Novell client and I can't get authenticated onto the network. I can't even get the Novell login to pop up. I can't even get out onto the internet which I can usually do even if I am not on the network. Neither my network admin nor I were here when these were originally deployed so maybe we are missing a step. Any help would be much appreciated. I would be glad to provide any additional info!

Thanks

Jamie

[JamieBenson]

I just wanted to further clarify that we are using 128-bit WEP encryption.

[john.preves]

You mention that the Card can associate to the AP, before the Novell client goes on.

Can you ping the AP at that point? The gateway? etc...

way back when - like three or four years ago, you could associate to the radio and not have network connectivity. If the radio associated then layer two was working. Which meant you typed the SSID in correctly.

If you still had no network connectivity then you needed to check the WEP key to make sure you typed it correctly.

If you can ping from the client to the gateway and what not, then the radio works and your problem lies elsewhere.

[JamieBenson]

John,

Thank you for the info. I tried pinging the AP and no luck. I went ahead and reentered the WEP key just in case and no dice still. Could this be a layer one issue or is layer two the more likely candidate? I know the card actually works since I just pulled it out of the last PC. Is there a step by step installation guide anywhere that you know of for installing the card and the Novell client? Maybe I am missing a step someplace or another. Thanks again for the help so far!

Jamie

[john.preves]

If you have association to the radio you have layer two. If you have network connectivity, you have layer three.

Please remove all instances of WEP off the AP and client and just test with the SSID in place. You should be able to ping now since there is no security. Build it back up until it stops again and see where you were when it stopped.

Good luck

[JamieBenson]

Thanks for the further info John. I would usually say sure and do it. I am only leary because a week ago this card was happily working in another machine. A interesting point to mention is that when I go into the access point all of my machines on the AP having their IP address in a field called IP Addr./Name and the machine I am having an issue with says unassigned. The last time we had this particular issue we had the network on 40 bit WEP encryption and then got a new card for a machine that could only run 128 bit so we changed the encryption and everything has been fine since. Once again thanks for all of your help!

Jamie