Wireless connectivity and WinXP Pro 64-bit

As to the title of this post: there is no easy way to do this thing.

I am using my basic data entry desknote at the kitchen table, killing my back and doing bare reading when I can stand it. This is exhausting. My new ISP has gotten the information to Covad so they should be able to do the pinball wizardry and get my line *tested*. As if it needs that...

So, living on the kindness of my neighbor's open wireless access point has been a mixed blessing, and nothing, and I do mean NOTHING will get my Win x64 machine to use any wireless adapter or card I currently own. With Covad's untimeliness, anything will take at least a week, and even my lady's computer would not be much better.

Remember, the Verizon/MCI merger is out to screw MCI customers. Just remember that.

After days of trolling the net I finally tried one search on the search engine of my choice and ran across this exact same discussion going on. And they actually had a real, live workable answer with one piece of new equipment. What was it?

A wireless game adapter! It takes in Ethernet from *any* computer and jumps it to wireless. NO DRIVERS NEEDED. I blinked very hard reading that this morning. I had just not considered that the gamers with Xbox and such like would actually be the sort to need this, until I considered my own youth and slothful habits and realized that this was on a par with my thinking then.

I am getting a Linksys WGA54AG.

I am a Linksys fan before they were bought out by Cisco. The products have been relatively reliable, especially their USB wireless adapter that I bought ages ago... it is a promiscuous adapter and has grabbed onto connections in very tenuous circumstances. Less well pleased with their PCI-G cards and the A/B/G router. I have had zero problems with their wired Ethernet equipment. So I am looking forward to this and having a new way of connecting to even more places.

And now that I *have* ordered it, I expect that Covad will now perform some sort of a miracle and I will actually have a wired connection before the new adapter arrives.