adhoc network, laptop locks up

[inverscottie]

I've tried for 4 weeks to fix this, and now run out of ideas......

I've a laptop running xp with a dlink wirless card and a pc also running xp, it too has a dlink card and is running an ADSL connection. There is no router or access point in the network so the cards are connected to run in adhoc mode.

The laptop sometimes locks up when surfing the net or just doing nothing. I can force the machine to lock up when I browse a folder on the PC from the laptop or vice versa. On viewing the error log the last entries before the lockup either came from the DNS service of the DHCP client therefore I came to the following set up.

The PC has an ip of 192.168.0.1, subnet mask 255.255.255.0
The laptop is 192.168.0.2, subnet mask 255.255.255.0 and a default gateway of 192.168.0.1, I also had to assign a DNS value on the laptop of 192.168.0.1. The DHCP and DNS clients are both disabled on the laptop.

I've turned WEP on and off to no effect. Given control of the configuration to windows and used the dlink software again to no effect, I still get lock ups.

I've run "network spy" and sometimes just before lock up the laptop sends a packet to ip 192.168.0.255 port 138, something to do with netbios but I'm out my depth here and don't understand what's happening.

Frustrated, pulling my hair out but enjoying the challenge. Can anyone help? And the bloody thing's just frozen again!

regards

[Greenstead]

Well, its not your communication settings at fault.

It sounds like a conflict or fault in the laptop.

After the freeze, you force it to power down? Doesn't windows report recovery from a serious error after reboot. It should report it to M$ and it might tell you what device caused the fault.

[inverscottie]

Thanks, there's no recovery from a serious error, sometimes there's error data in the event log on ms console. Sometimes it refers to a call across tcip for an ip address for the wireless card. I also get packets being sent with source/destination ip's of the actual hex mac address of the wireless cards.

As I'm out of my depth here I've not a clue as to what's going on.

I managed to access mp3 files across the link today and the data was pumping through the network. However this evening it locked 3 times in 20 minutes when on the net and again when I was accessing the same mp3 file.

Just had a thought there's an ethernet card built into the laptop, connection disabled. I'm away to uninstall it......

thanks