John,

Thanks for your help. This morning I spent time on the phone with a tech from India to sort out how the Netgear was connecting to Earthlink. I am not sure what all we did, but it involved a DOS screen at one point.

If I add any more computers, I'll quite possibly run a wire from the router hub that is in next to the DSL modem. I can move around easily in the attic and it's a lot cheaper. But I'm not planning that now, and by the next computer perhaps these networking cards will go for chunk change (this Linksys went for about $50 and I got the wireless router for $79. I went with the older 802.11b technology, because it would be overkill to pay for "g" when it won't speed up anything. The higher end "g" stuff is closer to $200 for the router.

Once I got this online I immediately updated all of the firewall and antivirus software, and right behind that there were 13(!) critical updates and service packs at Microsoft to install. So much for Dell giving me an up-to-date new computer!

We still have to get the sound card working (probably replaced) and the monitor has a flaw, so that will also get replaced. But I think we're out of the woods as far as the rest of the funcitonality.

Whew!

SRS