Vista wireless problems argh HELP

ok ok ok ok ok ok.
to begin with i am having a very annoying problem with my Dell XPS M1330 laptop which i bought in february. It has Vista Home Premium 32-bit and the Intel AGN 4965 mini pci-e card. (t5450 processor and 8400 gs graphics card i think).

The problem i am having is that i cannot connect to my home network. Let me explain what has happened.

I got the laptop in February and never have been able to get it to connect to our router. My brother has a laptop with the same version of Vista that works flawlessly with our home router although it too did take a while to configure it so that it could connect to the router (it ended up being a problem with the sound driver) so our router is compatible with Vista (SMCW904BRA Barricade ADSL 2/2+ modem/router for those who are interested).

The things i have to done to try to fix it:

• Update all drivers + windows updates
• Roll back wireless drivers to a previous version as some said that it worked for them
• mucked around with vista settings for hours on end...
• combed through forums using google looking for people with similar problems
• double check mac filter addresses in router (got my dad to do it)
• installed ubuntu on a partition to see if i could connect with that (couldnt even figure out how to install the drivers lol)

Im sure i did more than this but i cant remeber what...
anyway i did have some success --> using Nlite to add sata drivers to the windows xp install disk i installed XP, updated drivers for wireless and sound. Initially it could not connect; it couldnt aquire a network ip and came up with "invalid ip" once it did finally connect with limted or no connectivity.

I was thinking that this is all a problem with the MAC filter so as i could not change the settings on the router i loaded Technitium onto my lappy (mac address changer), whacked in the mac from my desktop and the DNS server (192.168.2.1) and it worked a treat! only... not when my desktop was connected to the network.

soooo upon finding out it was a MAC address problem i quickly reinstalled vista as although it is annyoing at times i do prefer the look a whole lot better..

so here we are right now i have a fresh vista install again with updated wireless and sound drivers and technitium loaded with my desktop's mac address and the DNS server address BUT after all this it wont connect and am getting the "windows could not connect because of a timeout" error message again sooo i am at breaking point and have no idea what to do.

i need my laptop with an operating system (preferably vista) to use for uni that i can use on my network at home aswell and hopefully soon because i got it in Febuary and still havent been able to use it ARGHHHH im so angry but anyway all help is greatly appreciated and i will end my ramble here and hope somone has an answer for me

just for refernce...

Laptop: Dell XPS M1330
T5450 Processor
nVidia 8400 gs
Intel AGN 4965 mini pci-e
Updated drivers

Router: SMC W904BRA Barricade Adsl 2/2+ (brothers laptop has vista and works with this)
WPA-Personal with TKIP
Passphrase
MAC filter (mac for my laptop is typed in incorrectly im assuming but still am using my desktops MAC which is correct)

 

Yeah, you can't use your Desktop MAC on your laptop at the same time your desktop is connected. If you cannot log onto your router to turn off MAC filtering (MAC filtering IMHO is more trouble than it's worth) you can try spoofing your MAC. Some drivers allow you to do this.

Or you can hack into your Registry
http://www.lan-secure.com/2008/02/mac-spoofing-using-windows-platform.html

Warning, plz set a System Restore point before you mess around with the Registry. Or export a backup copy.

 

Can you connect the laptop directly to the router with an ethernet cable? MAC filtering generally only applies to the wireless side, not the wired side, so that should allow you to connect to the router with the laptop.

Also, is the p/n of your router really SMCW904BRA, or is it SMC7904WBRA2? I ask b/c the SMC website doesn't list any products with a p/n of SMCW904BRA.

According to the user manuals I've found (see links below), this router uses standard MAC filtering; i.e., if MAC filtering is enabled, you then must add the MAC of each computer (actually, each wireless interface card) that is permitted to access the internet through the wireless router. So, to enable your laptop to connect to the internet through the router, you should access the router's administrative webpage, which should be at URL 192.168.2.1 (which is the default; if you've changed the default, then enter the new IP address for the router in your browser's address line). If the router's IP address has been changed, but you don't know to what, try the address you have for the default gateway - that should be the router.

Once there, obtain the MAC for your laptop and then enter it as a permitted MAC on the appropriate page of the router's administrative webpage. Alternatively, just disable MAC filtering since, as you yourself know, MACs can be spoofed, and anyone who can sniff packets will probably be able to find a MAC you're using if they really want to hack your network that way (better protection is to use WPA encryption instead).

For reference, the user manual for the SMC7904BRA2 can be located under the driver & firmware downloads section of the SMC Asia webiste or directly from here. The quick installation guide can be d/l'd from the same website, or directly from here.

 

sorry for the late post but in reply to surfasb i found out i couldnt use my desktop and laptop with the same mac addresses on the network when i used technitium (i could only connect to my network when spoofing my desktop's mac address) however it did prove to me that the mac address for my laptop was entered wrong, into the routers configuration page. So as i would prefer to have vista i reinstalled vista again, installed technitium, spoofed my desktop's mac but still no luck after all this coming up with a timeout error when trying to connect to the router. I dont think i can convince my father to turn off the mac filtering.

In reply to shyster, yes my router is a SMC7904WBRA2 i got the numbers mixed up or somthing :| anyway i know how to use routers and set them up and what not however the fact remains that i have no access to the router configuration page as my dad is in control of the network ive given him my mac address again (for the laptop) so hopefully he can check it and type it in right. oh and we are using WPA-personal TKIP settings atm.

I think my first post was a bit wordy so let me rephrase and summarise my problem:
I have a laptop with vista. it wont connect to my network because of a mac address or other problem. The router is using WPA-personal protection with TKIP encryption. I formatted my hard drive and installed xp to see if it would solve the problem. It couldnt connect so i spoofed the mac address from my desktop which currently is able to connect through wireless to the router. This worked. Because of this breakthrough i quickly reinstalled vista and spoofed my desktop's mac address but it wont connect.

does anybody know what could be wrong that is stopping vista from connecting to the network? it connects to other networks fine (that have less security i.e. no mac filters, connects to WEP networks fine)