belkin 54g USB network dongle 'device not recognized'

[Valhalla1]

I've been struggling with my sister's computer today, she has a belkin 54g usb network adapter that has been working fine for over a year. Today she rebooted her pc for the first time in a while and when it came back up she couldn't get online.

she said the little LED on the dongle usually blinks but it isn't anymore. I checked it out and tried unplugging/replugging and it never lit up and XP says "usb device not recognized"

I tried various combinations of uninstalling all belkin drivers, rebooting, reinstalling, removing all USB related drivers from device manager and letting XP reinstall the usb stack, it all ends up the same - 'device not recognized'. This is the only usb device she uses, and I've tried all 4 usb ports

right now I've got it powered off, all devices unplugged and sitting for an hour, based on some old tip I found when googling that maybe theres some electrical glitch causing usb issues. Seems last-ditch resort and I doubt it will work.

I want to say its a hardware problem but like I said it was working fine one minute, reboot and then nothing.. so I don't think it would have spontaneously died without some kind of physical trauma to the device, but who knows

 

[Valhalla1]

well that didnt work. I hate usb sometimes

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

Try connecting it to your computer and seeing if it works.

 

[VirtualLarry]

These have worked well for me in the past, good signal:
http://www.meritline.com/wireless-mini-usb-2-pen-drive-adapter---p-33917.aspx

Now on sale for $9.99!

 

[ultimatebob]

well that didnt work. I hate usb sometimes

Those Belkin USB wireless dongles are notoriously bad. I went though three of them in a year on my girlfriend's computers.