wireless--connected but can´t do anything

[jtbaker]

Hi! I've read through a number of the messages here and can't seem to find my specific issue addressed.

My Toshiba Satellite laptop, which has Windows XP Home Edition and a "Toshiba Wireless LAN Mini PCI Card", gets connected to one wireless network or another depending on where I take it--frequently with a signal strength of "good" or "excellent". Some of the networks are unsecured and some are "security-enabled". There is a firewall on my computer setup in whatever way the default is.

Inspite of all of this, I have never once been able to use a browser, email client, or the Norton LiveUpdate service while I was connected to the wireless network. This is my first experience with WiFi, but I'm a relatively experienced computer user (former website programmer but know nothing about networking, per se). I have also taken the machine to a friend´s house and have connected to her wireless network but was still unable to use any internet software even though her system and that of her roommate were working fine at the same time. I compared every setting I could find and our machines are set up in virtually the same way.

If anyone can aid in resolving the problem, even if it´s just recommending the services of someone I can pay, I will be eternally grateful.

Thanks!
Jame

[renegade600]

See if this is of any help.

[Smoothie]

It's quite likely that you won't beable to connect to the secure access points unless you have SSID for the wireless device your are trying to access. Also if encrypted you would have to have the encryption key. As far as the unsecure devices, you should be able to connect and have access to the internet. You would need to make sure they are allowing more than one system to access the device.
Smoothie