New laptop finally connected wirelessly!

Yes, it's taken me this long since I last wrote about my difficulties here to get both my laptops connecting wirelessly to the internet, although admittedly I became so irritated with the whole thing a few days after the new machine arrived (on 17th May) that I reverted to using my other machine (a 17" wide-screen quite bulky laptop using XP) wirelessly and the new machine (a 12" wide-screen laptop using Vista) with the LAN cable plugged in. OK so far as it goes, but it's not really what I got the new machine to achieve, which was better portability.

A couple of days ago (over the weekend) I launched myself back into further attempts to set it up - and failed. Then I realised I needed outside help so I sent an email to AOL (my ISP) on Sunday evening, as I've never liked using their online 'live' help, and a response came in yesterday evening, which I decided to do nothing with until this morning, as I thought it better to get a good night's sleep first. Anyway, I followed the instructions in their email this morning and got online wirelessly with the 12" laptop very rapidly. But part of the instructions involved changing the settings in the router (one of their recommended models, which I got through their supplier about 15 months ago), so of course now my 17" laptop would no longer connect!

Luckily the email contained a reminder of the telephone help number, however, so I have just spent about 40 minutes speaking with an agent in a call-centre in New Delhi and he took me through the procedures required, which involved changing my wireless network name and encryption key and then getting both my laptops connected up. I have always found AOL telephone help-lines to be excellent, unlike their online 'live' help, altough this is the first time I have spoken to someone in an AOL call-centre in India as it has always been in Waterford, Ireland, until now. However, the person I spoke with in New Delhi certainly knew his stuff, thank goodness, and we had a pleasant few minutes conversation at the end to round off the call

Now the pay-off; I can be online in bed, or in the kitchen, with a very compact high-performance laptop rather than my other much more bulky machine (excellent in it's own way, though, as it has a marvellous screen), which will now be in its rightful place in my study to act as my 'desktop'.