hey all
i've been a regular reader of this forum for three years now...excellent stuff people! really don't know why i didn't register before

anyway...i've recently encountered a strange network card problem

two days back, the power dips, windows (xp pro) reboots and restarts...this has happened millions of times over my years of use of computers...and things have died occasionally. on bootup, i notice my network not working. so in device manager, it shows my d-link 528ct adapter (10mbps, running a three pc coaxial network) as "unable to start...code 10 error" or something like that.

i uninstall it and have windows redect it...no go, same problem...

i swap slots (tried four different ones...each time uninstalling from device manager before shutting down)...no go, same problem

i swap in my brother's known, working IDENTICAL network card...no go

i go to safe mode, meticulously edit the registry and remove some ghost instances of the card...reboot, have it redetect...no go...i swap my card back in

i boot knoppix...and it works!!! i go back to windows, no go...?!?!!?

i do a windows repair install...no go

last night, i backed up my ntfs system partition, formatted (it needed a format because it was a converted ntfs drive) and reinstalled (with the network card physically removed) thinking maybe it was one of those stubborn windows things (the install is wonderful now)...no go...code 10 device cannot start...

i swap my brothers card back in again...and it works now!

i swap my original card back...no go in windows...i boot knoppix, and my card works?!?!

so i know there is something wrong with the card and i will replace it by tomorrow...but it works just fine in knoppix...and makes my motherboard unstable during bootup...what gives? anyone else experienced something like this?