HP laptop network

Hi,

Sister has a HP laptop with a Broadcom 802.11 b/g network card running Windows XP. Intermittently she reports network drops when using BBC iplayer at every 10 mins or so.

I've had it next to my wireless access point which works fine with other machines. I wrote a script which passes current time to a text file and then a ping of the default gateway. It continues to do this in a loop. Over 5 hrs whilst next to the wireless router it failed a single ping 3 times. Which is fine.

Move it to other end of the house and do the same (including an ipconfig in the script) - dropped a ping once every 10 - 15 mins over an hour. Not once though did the network card enter a disconnected state or lose its IP address (DHCP'd)

Move it to the room beneath the wireless router and it dropped a ping twice within an hour. Again network card didn't lose ip connectivity once.

I don't think HP will have any interest in such an intermittent problem, and indeed with normal browsing i don't think it would show up. With iplayer i can imagine the movie would stutter or stall...

What are my options? I can only think of:
Get her better wireless coverage in her house
or
A wireless network card with a high gain aerial.

Ideas please?

Thanks

 

. update card to latest driver?
. xp uptodate?
. if the comp has 2 different wifi managers (broadcom and windows) - try disable one and see

cheers ...