Can't Get Internet on Dell Inspiron E1505

Hey guys, my friend just reformatted his hardrive on his Dell Inspiron E1505 running Windows XP. We are both students in college right now and are having trouble getting the wireless network running on his computer. I know that the driver for the wireless internet card has to be re-installed, but I only have my Dell Resource CD for my E1705; he doesn't have the on that came with his. I tried installing a few of the internet card drivers on his computer from my CD, but none of them are picking up a wireless network. Are the drivers on his CD and my CD different? If they aren't, which driver am I supposed to be installing, because none of them seem to be working? If they are different, is there any place that I can find the driver necessary to run on his computer?
Thanks a lot guys, appreciate it.

 

Is the WiFi light coming on at all near the power button? Is your laptop able to connect wirelessly to his router? Also, is this the only router in the network?

I have that same laptop myself and had a couple issues regarding internet connection and the wireless router. So I may be able to help somewhat.

 

when you format you've got to use the service tag at dell/support for chipset, video, sound, nic/ethernet/network adapter.

no drivers on the resource cd.

 

HazzMatt- we are students at Binghamton University in upstate NY, so we're trying to connect to the school's wireless network, no routers are involved. My friend is away for the weekend and will be back later today, and he will let me know if the Wi-Fi light is on.

Bearone2- I'm not quite sure I understand what the service tag dell support is...how do I get my hands on it?

 

The service tag is right under the cd/dvd drive. The express code is there too. When ever I have an issue and call Dell, they always ask for that info. Maybe if your friend calls them and explains that he did a format, they will send you all the CDs needed. They did that when I had a major problem and I had to do a clean install of my OS. The CDs they sent had everything I needed for all my hardware.

Now that I know you don't have any routers involved and it's public access, that takes care of a lot. Not sure but there may also be a coflict but I don't think that's it. The conflict I'm thinking of is the laptop may have two different programs trying to access the network, they would be the Intel Proset and the OS. On my laptop I only let Intel determine and access the network.

 

downloading the drivers to another machine is somewhat quicker than wating for a cd.

 

well guys in an interesting turn of events, my friend got back from his trip for the weekend and his laptop was stolen from his dorm room, so i guess we can put this whole thing on hold until he finds it, thanks guys

 

I'm sorry to hear that. Hope he finds it. It's times like that you wish you opted for the lojack option.

Good Luck