802.11 CF blues...

[Nate]

I just purchased my first Pocket PC, a Compaq 3950. I also purchased a Linksys WCF11 Instant Wireless 802.11b CF card, and matching Linksys 802.11b 4-port router/switch hooked up to my DSL model (using PPoE). It wouldn't even install the drivers off of the disk, but it took to the latest drivers on their sitte just fine. When I check the adapters app, I am getting a 80-100% signal. I can't seem to access the internet, or the network in general through the card though. When I called the Linksys help line, they couldn't really tell me much besides that it is meant to run on Windows CE, and he wasn't sure about Pocket PC 2002. Is there some setting I need to change to enable my iPaq to access the network, or should I try to find another card/router combo, as even though they both support 128-bit WEP, they can't seem to hook up using either 128 bit or 64 bit, and I am forced to disable it. (This is where the tech pointed out that it supports up to 128 bit, and may not actually be able to use it...) Any advice/thoughts/suggesstions would be greatly appreciated.

Nate

[Jason Dunn]

Do you have a stable connection from your desktop? Do you have a laptop you can test the CF card with? Does the driver come with any sort of PING utility that you can test internal and external addresses?

[Nate]

I have a PPPoE DSL connection to Earthlink that all of my other desktops can use. I can ping my router and my desktops IP addresses from my iPAQ, but cannot however ping using NetBIOS names between the iPAQ and the desktops. All the connection manager settings are set for Work, and I have my desktops IP address set as the WINS server.

[Jason Dunn]

All the connection manager settings are set for Work, and I have my desktops IP address set as the WINS server.

Aha! Set your connection manager settings to INTERNET down the line, and it should work. You have to flip back and forth manually if you want to surf then sync.

[Nate]

OK, here's an update... I installed Pocket Hosts, which seems to have fixed my name resolution problem. I can now connect to 1 but not the other of my computers by using \\servername\sharename, and can connect to both using the terminal services client. I am not, however, able to connect to the internet yet. I tried every possible combination of connection wizard settings, except for the bottom setting, 'My network card connects to:', which seems to keep reverting itself back to Work. As far as the other desktop that it can ping, but not browse shares on, does anyone have any ideas? I have permissions to read set for everyone on the share, and read and execute on the file system. The iPAQ doesn't even ask me for credentials.

[Sven Johannsen]

:) Funny isn't it, the advice on that other forum you are working this issue on was all WORK down the line :o

In Pocket Hosts, did you list every box and it's IP? You didn't solve your name resolution problem, you just brute forced name and ip relatonships. That incidentally might fall apart if you are using DHCP off your router to assign addresses. The client requests an IP everytime it starts up, though typically you always get the same one back on a home network. You'll never get real name resolution on your internal machines unless you are running a DNS and/or a WINS server.

Are all the desktops Win2K? Or are there some 95/98 machines in the mix. Even between desktops those tend to be more problematic in sharing with Win2K and XP.

For network file sharing I would highly recommend Resco's Explorer. Their Share attaching interface is great. You see My Network, all the PCs and all the shares in a tree. You just need to click a share and have it attached. Then it shows up in the regular file manager portion. They have a demo download.