Same old same old.....

I've read several similar episodes, but am still not sure how to proceed. I recently upgraded a win98se sys to Winxp home w/o issues. This is wired to a cable modem (comcast). This works fine. I recently upgraded an old GW system (cel 466) running win95 os2 to Win98se (clean full install). This is my remote rig. I connected a Netgear MA814 v2 wireless router to the first system runnig xp as per instructions. All the lights come on like they should. I setup the router the way the help file/setup wizard suggests. The old remote rig has been fitted with the usb wireles Netgear MA111 (all this stuff was dirt cheap last week from CompUSA). It installs just fine with a l'il help from my Win98se CD. The adapter card receives the signal from the router (60%), and originally I was able to share the broadband connection (it went to MSN and d/l'd about 17 critical updates). I had to reformat this rig for some other OS problems. Now I can occassionally receive a signal from the router, but not share the broadband connect. I've tried several settings changes/ reinstalls, but no joy. Wherever I could I checked "direct connection to the internet." Would someone like to walk me through a fix before I return this gear to CompUSA. Cheers