Wireless Networking.

[Cruncher Pete]

I have a small annoying problem with my daughter's computers. She  uses a wireless LAN to network two computers.  Apart from the fact that I have no knowledge at all about WAN I am annoyed that I can not find the cause of the following anomaly: 

When she turns on her daughters computer hers comes on as well even though it was turned off the correct way, but it does not do so the other way. This only been happening since she disabled or in some ways mucked around with the Ethernet Driver as she was annoyed by the icon telling her that a Network cable is unplugged.  She is a chip off the old block for I forever Mickey Mouse with everything relating to computers even though most of the time I have no idea what I am doing.  I thought her problem is relating to a Bios setting like wake on LAN but although it is relating to the problem that options is disabled in the BIOS.

Any suggestions what could be the problem?

[Wang Solutions]

Hi Pete,

I think you are on the right track there with the wake on LAN, but there are also other settings that can affect this type of thing, including within the operating system (Control Panel->Network ... in Windows). Could also be in power management in either BIOS or in the operating system, a setting in the driver itself.

[Cruncher Pete]

Thanks WS. I ended up taking a drive to her place to see with my own eyes. A double check of the BIOS revealed nothing unusual.  I than thought why was she playing with the onboard Ethernet Driver since there was no cable connected to it as her system is wireless. I uninstalled the driver and just to be on the safe side, I reinstalled the one that was on her CD for the Motherboard.  This infact fixed two problems. One, the unwanted start and the second the Internet drop outs. It seems that the driver did interfare with the wireless set up even though it is not used.  One learns something new everyday..  Whilst I was there, I convinced her that she should turn on her machine for at least a couple of hours.  Needless to say, she is not aware that BOINC is running in the background in that time which pays for my trip to her place... biggrin

[WikiWill]

My guess is it was the the check box that says "Allow this device to bring the computer out of standby" which is in the Power Management tab (in Win XP anyway) of the network card configuration, within the network adapter properties.  Reinstalling the driver clears that I think.  Anyway good to know it's fixed with extras :)