Wierd wireless USB issue

[thedocta45]

Yes I said wierd when I meant to say weird its been a long day.

So I won't be the first to say that I hate when I have to recommend to a customer that they need a fresh OS install after troubleshooting a device for two hours.

Basically this Netgear wg11t wasn't connecting to the wireless in the house, more correctly it was connecting just partially, so no ability to view the network and no internet. I moved the device to a different USB port to see if that was the issue, did not fix it. I installed the USB dongle into two different computers and it worked fine. I moved the computer next to the router to see if it was some range issue, did not work.
So at this point I decided it's not the USB dongle that's the issue, because it works on all the other computers just fine. Uninstall the drivers, and reinstall them.
Now during the network set up portion of the install the USB dongle can't see any networks at all. At this point I'm thinking reinstalling vista is the best bet.
However, the HDD was going crazy during most of this, even when the computer was doing nothing, so I was thinking it could be a bad drive at this point.
Yes I did reenter the WEP key, yes WEP not even 128-bit its 64.

Now if it sounds like I am not troubleshooting this correctly keep in mind that I had none of my normal equipment with me, as I stupidly forgot my tech chest in the other car.

Regardless dose anyone have any ideas about what could have caused this issue? I can clarify if there is any confusion as to what I did, or why.