OK, so into my all-singing, all-dancing new machine, I decided to install a wireless network card, namely a D-Link AirPlus ExtremeG+, part code DWL-G520+.

And it broke stuff, BIG time.

Under Windows 2000, installed as per instructions, so drivers first, then card. Worked okay until reboot. When I rebooted, the "Preparing Network Connections" segment took about 5 minutes, and upon loading, any vaguely "system" related window (e.g. Network Connections, Add/Remove programs, Program Files or even the contents of C:\WINNT itself) were totally blank. I took the card out and the problems went away.

So next step - put the card back in, problems came back again. So this time I booted into Safe Mode and disabled it there. Now when I booted back into Normal Mode, none of the icons worked - I could select them, but couldn't double click. A friend suggested I clear out my startup menu entirely, and this helped. But now the problem is that my system reboots itself after two minutes.

To try and get around this I've upgraded to Windows XP, but the only difference is that it now TELLS me it's going to shut down, apparently due to the "Remote Procedure Call service terminating unexpectedly". And before anyone cries out "A-HA!", no, I do NOT have the msblast worm. And just as an aside, Windows XP's ability to auto configure a network sucks ***.

I am connecting (trying to at least) the wireless cards to a D-Link Router of the same spec - DI-624+ part code. The router seems to perform okay, as it is currently accepting connection from both my PC's via standard RJ45 CAT5 cables.

A bit more info in case it helps - I originally had the Router set up as DCHP server, with the PC's requesting addresses from it. The router was set to give a specific address to each unique MAC address. Towards the end I changed this and set up each PC with it's own static IP address under the TCP/IP settings for each card. It didn't make any difference to the stability of the system. Some confusion here under XP Pro, as I also have a Gigabit LAN connection built into the motherboard, and for some reason the stupid system was identifying my two Firewire ports as Ethernet connections - even though there is nothing connected to them at all! If I left XP to it's own devices (i.e. used the Network Setup Wizard) it never once managed to get it right. It doesn't help that the concept of bridging is new to me and I don't understand it - as far as I can see it is a very effective method of stopping any given LAN connection from functioning at all!

My personal opinion here is that I have bought equipment that is waiting for the rest of the IT industry to catch up with it. D-Link's sites outside of the UK do not have ANY information on the "+" versions of this card, and their ftp download site is devoid of ANY support files for it at all. The only info on it on the UK site is just an advertisement. I think it is just too damned NEW.

I am totally pissed off with this, and currently both DWL-G520's will be winging their way back to the shop as of next weekend. I have until then for some kind soul on here to figure out what the HELL is going on.