Windows/Wireless Air Station Issue

[manicchester]

Hey all...I thought I would post something that has happened to me a few times and see what you thought of it. Recently we got a wireless DSL setup at home and when I am using a wireless air station on my computer (running windows xp) there are times when it would connect and disconnect to the router every second or so for forever basically. Now when I uninstall the drivers and reinstall them that tends to keep that from happening and everything works fine. I'm thinking it's something I have to go into the router and see what's up but I figured I would ask and see what you all thought. Also, sometimes when I'm logged off for a while and come back I find that all my programs have closed, the internet cache is emptied, and the wireless air station is doing the same thing, connecting and disconnecting on and off every second. I know it's not a signal issue, because once I uninstall and reinstall the drivers, it seems to work fine. So I'm just curious what you all think...let me know if you need some more info about it...thanks a lot in advance.

Hardware I'm using...
2.17 GHz AMD Athlon
MSI K7N2 Motherboard
120 GB Serial ATA Drive
GeForce FX 5600 256 MB DDR
1 GB DDR RAM
52x24x52 Burner
16x DVD

[bballad]

Thats odd...is there any one with physical acess to your system? did you set p any of the security features on the air station?

[manicchester]

I'm not too sure of what security features are enabled..I know that everyone that lives around me isn't using any wireless system so I wouldn't think that there was any conflict there. No one uses my computer but me, so it's just really unusuall that it happens sometimes like that. We have 3 computers in the house...one is physically connected to the router and doesn't have any problems like that, and the other is using an air station that doesn't seem to have issues either as far as I know.

[waverebel]

I am having a similar problem, I have sent the AP back to the suplier.

Except I am using win2k sp4

A Dlink USB ext card and a I was using a 3COM office 11 AP

I have already reinstalled the system and swapped the USB card

[manicchester]

At first I thought it was the air station, so I switched it for a different one...right now I'm using the D-Link DWL-120+ station but it still did the same thing...

[Tiger Shark]

If your WAP has MAC filtering enabled then it is possible that someone is denying you service in order to hop on the connection at the same time.

I forget the details but it goes something like this.......

Joe Cracker has found your WAP and to his dismay he discovers that you are MAC filtering. He sniffs the network and determines the MAC address of an allowed WNIC. He then sends 802.11b messages that purport to come from the WAP telling the "legal" card to disconnect. Your WNIC dutifully does so and attempts to reconnect. It gets a reconnect to the WAP but Joe's machine keeps sending these out. In the periods where you are not connected he is MAC spoofing your WNIC and making his connection to whatever he wants and sniffing the response back off the airwaves. Pop a wireless network analyzer on it and see if there are numerous 802.11b disconnect commands running around. If there are there is a good chance this is what is going on.

[manicchester]

What would you suggest I can do if,assuming that is happening, to fix that problem? Sorry, I don't know much about wireless systems as of now, so any other advice is great.

[Tiger Shark]

Kinda hard to say from here. Considering if he has any skill putting up WEP will not work since he will open that door in a minute or so. Changing WNIC's as well would only last as long as it takes him to crack your WEP and resniff for the MAC address.

I would start by walking the local area with a laptop to see where your cloud extends to. Then you know he is inside that radius or close to it. If you are in a dorm area then you can see who knows about computers in that area and narrow down the culprit that way. If not then waiting for the symptom again and then taking a walk while it is occurring may turn up something. There are sophisticated methods of pinpointing this kind of person to a few feet but they cost mucho dinero.

[manicchester]

Hmm...well I figure the signal extends to about my yard and halfway into my neighbors yards because I walked around with my laptop and airstation once the wireless system was installed, but the thing is none of them are into computers in that way, so somehow I don't think it would be them....it's hard to say if there would be someone around doing this.

[Tiger Shark]

What about on the street side..... Anyone parked out in the street while this happens..... If not I'm probably barking up the wrong tree....