Losing internet connection, then Windows cannot shut down.

Windows XP SP3
Linksys WUSB11 2.6

First of all, my wireless internet loses connection on average 25 times a day. I don't even know where to begin to get help on that. I've tried many forums, no one seems to care unless you have a new and unique problem, not the old "I'm losing my connection" problem. I lose my connection and have to un-plug, re-plug the USB cable on my wireless device. That works 90% of the time.

The other 10% of the time, the connection does not show up in my system tray. I've tried power cycling my router, but that doesn't work. I've tried un-plugging my wireless device, re-plugging it, and that doesn't work either. I've tried to go into my device manager and disable/re-enable, but that just seems to freeze Windows entirely, forcing me to shut down my machine manually.

Now, when I shut from Windows, it just hangs at the shut down screen. I've left it on overnight and it was still frozen in the morning. When I'm forced to shut it down manually, I have to re-start my machine twice for Windows to run.

This machine was just re-built, it is less than a week old, and I should not be having these problems. Any help is appreciated.

 

I downloaded the program you linked to, but I'm sure I won't be able to accurately review whether it helped or not for several days or weeks. As for the other suggestions such as repairing the network, I can't do that because when I lose the connection, I cannot get it back to repair it. It disappears. Yes, there are three other machines connected to the network, and sometimes a fourth [laptop], two are wireless, one is hardwired. Unfortunately, no, I cannot connect to another network.

Thank you for your help so far.

Any thoughts as to why Windows would do what I described?

 

The box was checked, and I unchecked it. It does appear when I lose connection.

 

Well, I used the tool Evan suggested, and I did what you suggested, so I guess I'll see in a few days/weeks whether it helped.

Thank you for your help.

 

Well, I lost the connection a few minutes ago. I tried to power cycle the wireless device, but the icon disappeared from the system trey. I have a Google widget that shows all wireless networks in my area, and my wireless network was detected, but I was unable to connect to it. I went into device manager, and there was no icons or warnings next to the network device. I right clicked it, and tried 'enable' [does it disable when I lose my connection?], but it said connection failed. I went into the properties, and tried to disable the device, but that froze Windows and forced me to shut down manually, which then forced me to restart Windows twice, like it does every time this happens.

 

What do you mean it was just RE-BUILT? Any new hardware? New OS? OS reinstall? Did someone else do the work for you? These questions might help....