WIFI Key not working with XP. Help!

[gawguy]

I have always used a Netgear WIFI card to access my nome network. However, I now have a computer with built radio (or whatever it should be called.) I am trying to use XP to put in the key, however it is the wrong number of digits. My key is 8 ascii digits, let's say abcde123. I can enter that in the Netgear software and all is well. That's how I'm typing this post.

 

I get back a message from XP that I need 5 or 13 ascii characters or 10 or 26 hex characters. I have a 26 digit hex code that worked when we used an Airport Extreme router. This was all set up by my former roommate. That 26 digit key does not work with the router that Comcast provided. I understood that the 26 digit hex was a translation of abcde123, although looking at a hex table that doesn't make sense.

 

The computer does work with an unsecured network that happens to be in my area. I receive it and get online, no problem.

 

When I try to set up with XP, I get a message that there is a strong signal, but no connectivity because the network cannot assign my computer an address. Help!

[liquidflux]

There should be somewhere in the wireless settings of the router that lets you change the key. The setup menu probably accessed by typing your IP address into the browser, usually 192.168.62.1.

 

Once you get in there you can use the default key (not suggested) or make your own. You than have to copy that key exactly as it is into your XP settings. Also, if you're running any type of encryption, make sure you have that selected in your XP settings as well.

[manaomaiminam]

Not clear on what you are doing? You say you understood 26 hex digits were translation of you 8 ascii digits. Not so, an ascii designation is made up of 2 hex characters. Therefore hex designation of 8 characters of ascii would be 16 hex characters. If your roommate set up a 26 digit hex key and he told you it translated abcde123, then perhaps he added trailing "0's" (nulls). If your code were abcde123 (and I am sure it is not), try:

61 62 63 64 65 31 32 33 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00.

[exileexpat]

"26 digit hex was a translation of abcde123"

 

This is already hexidecimal

 

This translated into base 10 is

 

101112131415123

might be worth a shot

 

 

[Mekong]

Try 2,882,396,451 which is a ten digit number that is abcde123 (Hex) in base ten (Dec).

 

 

Exile where did you get the figure 101112131415123 from? 101112131415123 (Dec) is 5BF600ACEC53 (Hex) am I missing something

[manaomaiminam]

Interesting solution Mekong. But I am not sure we know what GawGuy is doing. When signing on to a network, depending on the adapter in your PC, some accept direct keyboard input of a password like "Johnsmith" and others (I actually have one)require you to input the password in hex designation of the ascii equivalent. Thus capital "J" would be be 4A and so forth. We are all trying to guess what Gawguy means by ascii abcde123. Is this keyboard input? Is it hex, therefore translate as Mekong did? What? Perhaps the fact that he chose abcde123 as an example is misleading since it could be hex. Gawguy, please clarify?

[Mekong]

This is getting rather akin the The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series where the answer to life universe and everything was 42 but now one knew the question. At the end of the series after mistaken time travel we were introduced to a group of bunch of cavemen playing stoneage scrabble, the letters placed on the board stated "What is 6 X 9?" When pushed on this ending the author of the novels, Douglas Adams who was a radical UK Physicist beofore he passed away replied "No One makes Jokes in Base 13 anymore"

 

 

LIFE Is .... Paradoxically Coincidental To The Ironical Tyrrany Applicable To The Unparalleled Definition Of Reverse Entropy

 

 

 

 

[liquidflux]

I think the old 26 digit hex number he has is irrelevant here, since that was the password for his old router.

 

He now has a new router, which will obviously have a different key.

[Mekong]

OK,

 

This has been going onto long, lets give the answer.

 

As Liquidflux stated 192.168.62.1. is the most common URL for you router (if not look up in your routers technical manual that you hope you did not throw away)

 

As long as the laptop you are using is the same one you set up your router with, connect to your routher via the LAN port and log on to homepage (192.168.62.1 or alternarive), there you can reset your WiFi security settings.

 

Smallprint

 

This Works with my ISP, not sure if it is applicable globaly

[keekwai]

"The computer does work with an unsecured network that happens to be in my area. I receive it and get online, no problem."

 

Are you sure that this is not your own Comcast modem/router you are connecting to? If that is a wireless modem/router supplied by the ISP these often have an unsecured wireless signal.