I have an HP ze4600 recently purchased used. The system appears to run
fine with all sorts of programs and dvd's. The problem first arose when
I purchased and Orinoco Gold a/b/g card for it to surf online. after a
few moments on the net the whole thing froze and I had to manually
reboot. What should I try? I searched for a while on this and elevated
my heart rate by seeing alot of posts telling others with the same
problem that their computers are about to die. Is mine nearing the same
end? Like I said it works fine offline.

Rory Deol wrote:
> I have an HP ze4600 recently purchased used. The system appears to run
> fine with all sorts of programs and dvd's. The problem first arose when
> I purchased and Orinoco Gold a/b/g card for it to surf online. after a
> few moments on the net the whole thing froze and I had to manually
> reboot. What should I try? I searched for a while on this and elevated
> my heart rate by seeing alot of posts telling others with the same
> problem that their computers are about to die. Is mine nearing the same
> end? Like I said it works fine offline.

Well, given that it's not about to die, which you can't do anything
about. There are a couple things that it could be.

You can try to find updated drivers for your wireless card (from the
manufacturer only!)
You can try to update your system's bios (from hp's website only)

You can try a different brand wireless card (you can borrow one from a
friend, instead of buying one, just to test)

Every device on your laptop draws power, you can try disconnecting any
external devices (anything plugged in that doesn't have to be there,
like printer, external mouse, keyboard, external hard drive, external
anything), and yank the cd rom, and floppy drive, to see if it's a
power related problem. Also yank any other pc cards you have installed.

It's used, so make sure you have the correct power brick. Many
notebooks will run, with WAY less juice than they call for (even a
whole amp less).... until you start making demands on the system.


It is also prudent to look for viruses and spyware, and check the hard
drive and ram, just in case.