I am having difficulty installing a pcmcia card from Socket. the
function of the card is to provide a serial port for my Fujitsu laptop
which does not have such a port. I am running Win XP tablet pc
edition, which is basically Win XP Pro 2ed with extra drivers.

What happens: when I insert the card, it is recognized. the "add
hardware wizard" opens up. But when I point the wizard to the location
of the drivers (I've double checked this, I know they are in the
location I am indicating) the wizard doesn't even search, it just says
the software could not be found.

This is also happening when I'm trying to install another piece of
hardware, a handheld pda. I'm guessing there is something on the
system that is preventing the add hardware wizard from functioning
properly.

I've tried to install while disabling Zone Alarm and Norton Utilities.
Still no luck.

One thing I've thought of is trying to load the software first, then
install the card. But the software from Socket doesn't have an obvious
way of doing that, and, to be honest, their tech support has been less
than responsive.

Another thought I had was to boot into safe mode, try installing the
card and software from there.

Any suggestions?

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Request for Question Clarification by sublime1-ga on 07 Feb 2006 19:14 PST

stevens...

Windows tends to look for .inf file extensions when it uses
its installation Wizards. If the drivers are not packaged
with an .inf file, it may reject them as "not found".

Optimally, if there is no .inf file, the hardware comes
with alternate instructions for installing the drivers,
often from an executable file (.exe). The instructions
are often included in a 'readme.txt' file that comes
with the drivers.

What file format are the drivers in, and is there an
.exe file amongst them, or a readme.txt?

sublime1-ga

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Clarification of Question by stevens1234-ga on 08 Feb 2006 06:50 PST

there is an inf file. for some reason the add new hardware wizard does
not locate it. I've tried downloading the file from the website and
putting it on the c: drive, also it is on the cd-rom.

Are you hot swapping this or putting it in before boot...that
sometimes makes a difference to our quirky friend called Windows.

Also...have you made sure about compatibility on www.socket.com on the
right hand side there is a link that you can use to see which of their
products are compatible with the Fujitsu...I don't know the exact
model of Fujitsu nor the exact model of Socket product so I will leave
that for you...

If it 'is' compatible....

Is there no setup.exe on the CD?  It should launch an HTML page to
step you through the process...here is a note I found on a site:

Run Socket's Setup Centre before installing or using the Socket card

The Setup Center is an HTML-based guide that runs in Internet Explorer
and provides information on the following:
? Installing the Socket hardware and software
? Accessing the user documentation for your product
? Registering your product.

WARNING!
Do not install or use the Socket hardware or Software until you run
the Setup Centre provided on CD.

To run the Setup Centre
1. Insert the Socket Installation CD into the CD-ROM drive.
2. Use My Computer or Windows Explorer to access your CD-ROM drive.
Click on SETUP.EXE
3. The Setup Center will run in Internet Explorer.
Follow the instructions for your device type and operating system.

I've tried the installation both ways: putting the card in when
Windows was fully loaded; also inserting it before booting.

there is a setup file on the CD. It opens an html file, which
basically tells you what the written documentation says: insert the
card, wait for the add new hardware wizard to open up, then follow the
directions.

Re compatibility, my model is not listed in their "compatability
matrix." It is a T4020D. But neither Fujitsu nor Socket technical
support had anything to say about this issue.

However the main reason why I'm not focusing on compatability is that
a similar problem happened when I tried to install a Palm handheld.
The add new hardware wizard didn't work with this as well. However,
there was a setup file on the Palm CD that installed the Palm drivers
without attaching the handheld first, so I could avoid the new
hardware wizard.

btw, I was able to install both pieces of hardware on a different
computer, without a problem, so I'm fairly certain nothing is wrong
with either the socket card or the accompanying software.