Computer Insanity

We've been engulfed in computer insanity ever since we started getting serious about Jason's need for a laptop up at college. The school help desk personnel insisted that we needed to have Windows XP installed on the laptop and not brand new Vista, which apparently has some kind of compatibility problems with a lot of existing software. A patch is coming in the fall but in the meantime they wanted us to stick with XP.

Thus began the search for the elusive Windows XP, which has almost totally disappeared off the market in favor of Vista. That's how much Microsoft wanted to force us to change operating systems, like it or not.

I found a Dell Inspiron 1501 that carries XP but has enough memory to accommodate Vista at such time as it is tamed and Jason is ready to install it without fear that it will make everything else go haywire. So we bought it. Got it into the house, and promptly discovered that it could not connect to our wireless router. We have DSL and they supplied us with a Westell 327W modem and wireless router when we signed up for the service.

First we called Dell and asked for help. The person who assisted us was continually trying to push us into buying a software support package for $239. I refused to buy it. So far as I knew I'd paid extra for us to have 4 years of lojack plus a 4 year warranty where they would come to the house and fix whatever was wrong. He connected to our Inspiron, diddled around in the software, and was unable to get it to work. Finally he concluded that we needed to speak to Verizon because it was a "router problem." This made it sound like our router didn't work.

Next, I called Verizon. First I got a fellow who sounded hesitant as if he was unsure of what he was doing. I should have taken this as a warning but I didn't. I let him try to help us make sure our router was working. At one point he had us do a hard reset on the router, which was a major mistake. This knocked us entirely off the verizon network and we had to sign on again as if it was an entirely brand new DSL system. Another hour to hour and a half down the tubes! Finally the Verizon techie admitted he had no way of knowing whether the problem was with our router or with the Dell computer.

Next, I thought of a way to test it. Jason's friend Noah was spending the night and his Mom Stephanie is pretty much of a computer techie herself. So I asked her to bring over a laptop and see if it could connect to our router. She came over with her thinkpad and after a little initial trouble she was not only able to detect our router but she got online with it. She also discovered that moving our computer around seemed to change connectivity.

So, she concluded that something was wrong with the wireless card inside the computer, it was loose or not properly connected or something. At one point Jason was able to detect our own router but at no time was he able to connect to it. A day or two later, he was able to get online but using other unsecured routers from nearby. This, of course, was unsatisfactory because it was completely unreliable.

I called Dell and refused to go through the troubleshooting rigmarole again. I asked for them to send a technician to repair the card but they would not do that. Instead they offered to send us a replacement computer. I agreed.

The computer showed up yesterday and was not any better at getting connected than the first one. Once again we called Dell, and this time got a manager on the line since I said that if something wasn't done I was going to return both of them and get a refund. The manager said there was a connectivity incompatibility between the Inspiron and our router. Wow! First time we heard of that. If we'd been told this clearly on the first phone call we could have saved a bit of time. He went through the sharing and tried to download some software to fix the router but it did not download. Our connectivity was slow and we got an error message that the software was corrupted. Gee, just lovely. Now I wonder whether we have to get rid of what was downloaded in order to get a new router to work. I bet so, because these computers are certainly nothing less than a royal pain.

So I called DHL and at least they came promptly and with no problems to pick up the replacement computer which was of no more use to us at this point than the first one.

And that's the way it is. With any luck the next phone call will take care of it. I sure hope that by August 30th when we head up to Delhi, Jason has a computer that actually does connect to wireless. After all we're paying for it!