Encryption key.passphrase

Closed
ongmac - Feb 13, 2010 at 12:54 PM
xpcman Posts 19530 Registration date Wednesday October 8, 2008 Status Contributor Last seen June 15, 2019 - Feb 13, 2010 at 01:02 PM
Hello,
I have a similar problem to above. My 8-yr. old Dell Dimension 4500 with WinXP had catastrophic hard drive failure. I bought a new Compaq (HP) Presario 5320 with Win 7 Home Premium. It was a joy to watch start up. I just plugged in keyboard, speakers, mouse, and Ethernet and powered on. I answered a few questions, Win 7 configured my home network, I was connected to Internet. My problem is I cannot find the wireless router security key/phrase being used so my wife and daughter cannot share the Internet connection. My router is an older MS MN-500 that had a 40-character WEP key as the only security and the backup is on a 3 1/2" floppy, and the hardcopy document on the failed hard drive. I only have a combo CD/DVD drive on new box. Plus, I', not sure the MN-500 supports newer WPA & WPA2 protocols. So, I would like to find & read the key currently used, get a new router later. Can I find & read it in Win7? Or can I take a compatibility chance - disconnect the router, delete the Win-7 Home network established, and start all over with my old router and hope for the best. I appeciate your thoughts.

1 response

xpcman Posts 19530 Registration date Wednesday October 8, 2008 Status Contributor Last seen June 15, 2019 1,825
Feb 13, 2010 at 01:02 PM
If you have an existing computer that connects via wireless then you can use this software to display the encryption key.

https://download.cnet.com/s/wirelesskeyview/



There is a problem with network access when using Win 7 with older operating systems:

Did you set up Homegroup for networking in Windows 7?

Homeoup only works with Windows 7 grcomputers and will not talk to your XP computer.
If so, you will need to change the networking system to one that XP can use.

On your Windows 7 computer:

* Click the Start button at the bottom left of the screen,
* Then go to the Control Panel and choose Network and Sharing Center.
* Click the link under "view your active networks" (if you've set up a Homegroup, the link should say "home network").
* In the next window choose "Work network" that will switch you from a Homegroup to a workgroup so your two computers can talk to each other.


Before you can network the computers, you must assign the same workgroup name to both of them and SHARE folders in Explorer.
0