I have a sony vaio laptop that runs xp home edition. The laptop comes
with wireless card that supports both 802.11b and 802.11g. My linksys
router only supports 802.11b. My problem is that periodically the
wireless connection gets dropped and the network connection wizard at
the task bar pops up and says there
are multiple wireless network available and I have to manually re-connect to my
router. 

I had a vaio before that only supports 802.11b and I never had the same problem. 
I have configured the card to do only 802.11b, but there are other
802.11b network in my range.

Is there a way to fix it?

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Request for Question Clarification by aht-ga on 18 Sep 2004 18:45 PDT

whatisthematrix-ga:

There may be some ways to restrict your laptop's wireless card to
connect only with your linksys router; in order to determine if there
are, though, it will help if you can provide some more information
about the wireless card. If it is one that is built into the laptop,
can you tell us the model number of the laptop? If instead it is a
separate wireless adapter (PCMCIA or USB), then please tell us the
make and model number of the adapter itself.

Thanks,

aht-ga
Google Answers Researcher

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Clarification of Question by whatisthematrix-ga on 19 Sep 2004 09:00 PDT

The card is built into the laptop. It's a sony vaio S170.
The device manager shows the card as Intel PRO 2200BG

whatisthematrix-ga:

The causes of your problem are the Windows XP Zero Configuration
Service that is currently managing your wireless networking
connection, and the fact that your new laptop's WiFi adapter has
higher sensitivity compared to your previous VAIO's adapter. To
achieve the results that you are looking for, it will be necessary to
use another wireless management program, such as the Intel PROSet
client software that comes with the Intel PROSet 2200BG miniPCI (and
should have been installed on your VAIO as part of the Sony factory
deployment of Windows XP Home), and set it to ignore the other
networks that are now visible.

Please look on your Start Menu>Programs to see if you have an
Intel>Intel PROSet program installed. If not, you can download and
install it from here:

http://support.intel.com/support/wireless/wlan/pro2200bg/sb/CS-010623.htm

The manual for this program can be found here:

http://support.intel.com/support/wireless/wlan/pro2200bg/sb/CS-008179.htm

Using the information that starts on page 3 of the PDF version of the
manual, you will need to do the following:

1. Disable Windows XP Zero Config and enable Intel PRO Set to manage
your wireless settings (see pages 52-54)

2. Create an unique profile for your home network (if you have not
already changed your Linksys router's SSID, now is the time to do so
in order to make your network unique from any neighbors' networks)
(see pages 9-12)

3. Set the PRO Set software to "Connect to available networks using
profiles only", and select the unique profile you created (see pages
4-5)


Since there are clearly other wireless networks (and wireless users)
in your area, it is important that you enable encryption (WEP) for
your network; this is on page 10 of the manual for your Intel WiFi
adapter. You will of course need to use the exact same WEP key in your
Linksys router's configuration. Often, the easiest way to create the
WEP key is to use the 'Generate' feature in your Linksys router to
generate a 128-bit key, then copy the hexadecimal numbers that make up
the key into your PRO Set profile.

Note that if you are having to make any changes on the Linksys router,
you should do this using a wired network connection; obviously, if you
make any changes to the wireless settings, you may not be able to
re-establish the wireless onnection right away, so a wired connection
is necessary for debugging.

Please follow the detailed procedures in the Intel PRO Set user guide
to accomplish the three steps above, and let me know if you need any
clarification.

Regards,

aht-ga
Google Answers Researcher

What is hapening here is that your Lpatop is geting association with
another Access point that is in the vincity of your network.their are
multiple ways to avaoid this.You can hardcode the AP that you want to
talk with in your client software that manages the Wlan on your
desktop.

Look in for the following 

1 make sure you have one profile and not multiple ones .
2 in that Profile set the SSiD as ABCD or any thing else which is not
the default for your Ap .eg Cisco's default ID is Tsunami.

once this is done your laptop knows whome to talk with ...and it
ignores any other AP with different setings .

Regards
Sammy