Wireless.

Those of you who are familiar with the saga of me owning this Acer Aspire 4720Z are aware that I have trouble with my wireless. On Vista, on Ubuntu, on multiple networks in multiple places. The only commonality is the card, and I've heard of other people having similar problems with Acers.

So yes, everybody kept telling me to do the usual things, and I had to tell them, "Yes, I did that, but when it X and Y and Z in addition to that, I know it didn't work," and eventually they give up because they realize I have actually tried everything they know.

Turns out it was something insane. Brian and I realized we only have serious ridiculous trouble with our network when we're trying to be in AIM chats, which is inconveniently enough ONLY when I'm trying to GM our chat game. Having had enough of that, we switched to IRC for the remainder of game. I asked Brian to turn off his AIM, and I logged in through Pidgin.

Behold. I have not disconnected since.

What the fuck was AIM doing?!

Ah, well. Somehow we stumbled on new information. This may help us solve the underlying problem, but for now at least I know what to avoid (even if I have no idea why).

Wireless.

Those of you who are familiar with the saga of me owning this Acer Aspire 4720Z are aware that I have trouble with my wireless. On Vista, on Ubuntu, on multiple networks in multiple places. The only commonality is the card, and I've heard of other people having similar problems with Acers.

So yes, everybody kept telling me to do the usual things, and I had to tell them, "Yes, I did that, but when it X and Y and Z in addition to that, I know it didn't work," and eventually they give up because they realize I have actually tried everything they know.

Turns out it was something insane. Brian and I realized we only have serious ridiculous trouble with our network when we're trying to be in AIM chats, which is inconveniently enough ONLY when I'm trying to GM our chat game. Having had enough of that, we switched to IRC for the remainder of game. I asked Brian to turn off his AIM, and I logged in through Pidgin.

Behold. I have not disconnected since.

What the fuck was AIM doing?!

Ah, well. Somehow we stumbled on new information. This may help us solve the underlying problem, but for now at least I know what to avoid (even if I have no idea why).

Wireless.

Those of you who are familiar with the saga of me owning this Acer Aspire 4720Z are aware that I have trouble with my wireless. On Vista, on Ubuntu, on multiple networks in multiple places. The only commonality is the card, and I've heard of other people having similar problems with Acers.

So yes, everybody kept telling me to do the usual things, and I had to tell them, "Yes, I did that, but when it X and Y and Z in addition to that, I know it didn't work," and eventually they give up because they realize I have actually tried everything they know.

Turns out it was something insane. Brian and I realized we only have serious ridiculous trouble with our network when we're trying to be in AIM chats, which is inconveniently enough ONLY when I'm trying to GM our chat game. Having had enough of that, we switched to IRC for the remainder of game. I asked Brian to turn off his AIM, and I logged in through Pidgin.

Behold. I have not disconnected since.

What the fuck was AIM doing?!

Ah, well. Somehow we stumbled on new information. This may help us solve the underlying problem, but for now at least I know what to avoid (even if I have no idea why).