Can't find Ethernet driver for windows xp home

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I recently had to reinstall my copy of windows xp home. I had a computer store make a copy of all the drivers for my machine. They insist that they put the driver for my Ethernet controller on that CD as well. However, I can’t seem to locate it nor can I locate a driver for it online. I have been to the Microsoft site for drivers, as well as cnet. There are no drivers for my Ethernet controller. Where can I find one, and how do I decide which one is the correct one for my machine. This laptop (Acer Aspire 5610AZ) came with vista, I found that I hate vista. So I bought xp and up till now had no issues with xp. I still love xp, I just need that Ethernet controller. There is a yellow ? by it in my hardware manager and when I try to update the driver through there, I get the trouble shoot window. And no answers. Can you please help? I will tell you now, I am no computer pro. Please keep any and all answers in simple plain English. Thank you in advance for any and all help.

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Hi Bruce,

Go back to Device Manager and right click on your Ethernet controller entry that has the yellow ‘?’ beside it. See if there is a description, brand name, and model number for your Ethernet card. Then you can go to the card manufacturer’s web site to locate the appropriate driver.

If you cannot find any useful information to identify your Ethernet card in Device Manager, then you can download and run SIW (System Information for Windows), which will identify everything in your computer. SIW is a free download.

Alternatively, you can go to Acer’s support site and using your laptop’s model number (and/or serial number), you can access their downloads section for the appropriate XP driver for your laptop. However, sometimes there can be two or more different Ethernet cards offered in the same model laptop, so you may still need to identify your specific card.

Check out this link to Acer support for the 5610 laptop. They list three possible Broadcom Ethernet card model drivers for XP:

Lan_BCM5789_v8.48.0.0.zip
Vendor: Broadcom
Supports:
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition x32
Microsoft Windows XP Professional x32
v8.48.0.0
12/02/2008
87.7 KB

Download Lan_BCM5789_v8.48.0.0.zip
Lan_BCM5787_v9.25.0.0.zip
Vendor: Broadcom
Supports:
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition x32
Microsoft Windows XP Professional x32
v9.25.0.0
12/02/2008
85.1 KB

Download Lan_BCM5787_v9.25.0.0.zip
Lan_10_100M_v4.37.0.0.zip
Vendor: Broadcom
Supports:
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition x32
Microsoft Windows XP Professional x32

Just confirm the one in your laptop, download and install.

Hope this helps.

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You may often need to install a chipset driver first.

sometimes when I cannot find the driver on the CD I Right mouse click on the Yellow exclamation point and select update driver. I find on HP stuff it will find the driver after a while. Even after i searched the CD for it and had no luck.

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