I hate computers.

Wait, no I don't. I hate Linksys.

With one single exception, I have never successfully installed a piece of their hardware without having to get on the phone to technical support. You'd think I'd learn. But no.

Yesterday I bought a Wireless G adapter for Tim's desktop. I thought it would be an improvement over his Wireless B adapter (also Linksys, by the way), as I had a Wireless G Router (also Linksys, and also a right royal pain in the arse) and the signal in the shed was pretty weak. He was unable to get a 'net connection yesterday (although he had one the day before), so I thought, hey, brilliant idea, let's upgrade your equipment.

Not content to set myself up for insanity with just one piece of hardware, I also bought a Wireless G Range Expander. Also by Linksys.

Well, whatever the trouble is with getting a 'net connection, it isn't in the wireless adapter, because the single exception to my having to call tech support was installing the bugger on my own desktop. Works a treat. On Tim's computer? Not so much. It connects to the access point, but cannot acquire an IP address. Everything is configured properly, all Tim's settings are as they should be, every other computer in the house is happy and joyfully surfing the 'net, but Tim's computer cannot acquire an IP address. I have not gone so far as to run a CAT5 out to the shed to test a hardline connection. I haven't got one that's long enough, I'll have to go buy one. In the meantime he can check his email on his Mac in the house.

So, this morning I proceeded to set up the Wireless G Range Expander with the handy dandy Setup Wizard on CD. Um, no, I didn't.

Got through all the stuff, security password and encryption keys and la and da and stuff and watched as the software configured the range expander and, boom, at the very end of the procedure, an error message:

"WRE54G can not associate with this AP in repeater mode."

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?

Me, being me, unplugged everything, replugged everything, reset everything, *including* the router, reconfigured the router, went through the whole procedure at least eight times.

Now, seriously, people with healthier psyches than mine would probably have chucked everything back into their boxes by now and taken them back to the mindless drones who sold them and said, "Give me a credit or I'll sic American Express on you!" Not me. Never me. I was going to make this puppy work even if I *did* have to call tech support.

Which I did.

I'll skip the bits where I had to ask the very nice Indian gentleman to please speak more slowly. I have hearing loss, and I have difficulty hearing on the telephone because part of my ability to hear a conversation is to see lips moving and when I don't have that it's difficult for me to understand unaccented English, so I have a particularly hard time understanding accented English on the telephone, whatever the accent. My English friend Mervyn understands this very well; although I've been listening to his accent for nearly 20 years, I still frequently have to ask him to repeat himself when we're having a telephone conversation. Although he tells me that *I'm* the one speaking accented English :).

I'll also skip the bits where I had to convince this tech that I wasn't a complete nimrod, although sometimes it's just easier to play dumb and muddle through being told how to ping an IP address. I understand that, possibly, more often than not, they get a novice on the other end of the phone, so that's just my tender little ego getting irritated. But I did waylay him somewhat by explaining right out of the gate that all the firmware was up to date, as, in my experience (and I've had a *lot* of experience), that's the first thing a Linksys tech will ask you to do.

The meat of the matter is that in order to get these two pieces of hardware, made by the same manufacturer, designed to work together, to, you know, actually work together, I had to disable WEP security on the router, activate the Auto Configuration on the expander, setup the range expander's security through the Web interface, reset security on the router through the Web interface, then power cycle the range expander.

Why the hell do they bother with a Setup Wizard with *any* of their hardware? It never works, but every time I buy something of theirs I'm hitting my thumb with the same damn hammer before I suck it up and call them.

In any case, it's all working now, although Tim's computer still can't get a 'net connection. Which is, sort of, where I came in, eh?