Vista Lap top Wireless doesnt work.

[excelscior]

I have a GateWay Laptop. It is about 3 years old. It works well and I mainly use it for email and youtube. A few months ago I installed a free software called GameBooster. This was supposed to give the CPU added power by tweaking different system settings. One of the options was a internet tweak. Tweaking these setting would maximize the DSL speed. Well I tried it and since then my laptop doesnt or can not connect. Says my router is either too far or isnt the same router # I have on my settings. I have checked the WEP encryption and it is the same 12 digit # I always use. Any suggestions? I am not too knowledgeable on Vista OS. I was thinking of upgrading to Win7 soon. Would doing this make it easier to troubleshoot? Thank you for any help in advance. P.S. I undid whatever the software had done. But that didn't work. I removed the software also and that didnt do anything either.

[Rocketmech]

Have you tried System Restore ?

How to use Vista System Restore

[excelscior]

I tried the system restore feature last week on my Vista OS laptop. Some lame message came on saying that it could not continue with completing. So I pressed the ok and then the pc restarted and now it just stays dark grey. After the microsoft bar come on like it is going to start. Dark grey screen pops up and stays that way. This is annoying to say the least. I never liked Vista from what many of my friends had told me about it. I still don't like it and maybe I will get Win7 for this laptop.

[Midknyte]

Only 12 characters? Neither WEP 64 or 128 use 12 characters.

When configured for 40-bit encryption, 802.11 products typically support up to four WEP keys. Each 40-bit WEP key is expressed as five sets of two hexadecimal digits (0-9 and A-F). For example, "12 34 56 78 90" is a 40-bit WEP key.

When configured for 128-bit encryption, 802.11g products typically support four WEP keys, but some manufacturers support only one 128-bit key. The 128-bit WEP Key is expressed as 13 sets of two hexadecimal digits (0-9 and A-F). For example, "12 34 56 78 90 AB CD EF 12 34 56 78 90" is a 128-bit WEP key.

Why are you only using WEP anyway? You should really be using WPA or WPA2.

Did you try temporarily disabling encryption and connecting?

I was thinking of upgrading to Win7 soon. Would doing this make it easier to troubleshoot?

No. Upgrading probably won't fix existing problems.

It's easy to bad mouth Vista, but I would blame Gamebooster.

[Ol'Tunzafun]

A clean install of Win 7 would surely fix it, but failing that, have you tried removing the display adapter in safe mode ? Safe mode with networking might allow you to download a new graphics driver, if your networking will still work. Do you have an ethernet cable to connect directly to the router? Once you get rid of the grey screen we can see what can be done with your wireless.
BTW: a 12 digit # could never have worked with WEP: it must have been WPA.