Slow Connection with WPA and Inspiron 1505

Two things to do:

First, make sure you have upgraded the router's firmware to the latest version. Even if it works fine with other hardware, a firmware upgrade could fix issues with new wireless cards you are putting on it.

Second, make sure you have the latest driver from Dell's website for your wireless card. Yesterday, this happened to me: a friend's laptop hard drive crashed and Dell sent her a new one. I helped her re-install Windows XP with the CDs Dell had sent along with the drive for her laptop. Well, the driver CD had the wrong driver for the wireless card! It wouldn't function at all. It kept saying that the wireless card was a DW 1300. I had to pry off the panel to see which wireless card it really was (a 1350). Went to the website, got Dell's latest driver, installed it, detected a 1350 instead, and all was well.

So, even though I had a CD with a label that matched her computer's model number, it still didn't work right. Get the latest driver from the web for your wireless card - maybe WPA performance will improve. Maybe your card has the wrong driver, too, one that mostly works but not completely. Or maybe an updated driver has fixed this issue.

There is also some chance that you will need to get a new wireless router. My old Netgear router didn't coexist well with a no-name wireless desktop card using WEP; with newer wireless routers, even not of the same brand-chipset, all was well.

Andrew -- ******************************************************************* *******************************************************************