it does take a little getting used to and letting the program learn, it will pop up and ask you do you want to let such and such connect to the internet you will likely know what is asking because you are trying to use something that needs access so in those cases say yes, if it is something that needs to access it regularly like your antivirus check mark where it says remember this so it does not ask each time. Do not give server rights some things will ask but it is not necessary once you say no to server rights it will next pop up asking for access, that you can allow. If it is something you do not recognize asking then say no and see if you can determine what it is, if you had some type of malware that is trying to phone home you would not want to allow that access. I prefer mine to pop up and ask each time with some of the rarely used stuff I like to know what is connecting. When getting zonealarm or any other free firewall or any program actually be very alert during the install period and uncheck or do not allow the addition of any toolbars or extras, Zone alarm unfortunately now does try to include a toolbar with the free version, you do not want that toolbar. and if you have problems or questions just ask. When something like generic win 32 something ask for permission say yes or you will not be able to connect to the internet, that is one to check mark always allow. Yes as grandms said with cable you have a direct connection and with no router in between you and the internet that even more dictates the use of a software firewall. The benefit of a router with built in hardware firewall is great but I use both on my windows machines, actually my linux has guarddog firewall built into it so I even have one on linux. The link I had provided the main reason I do refer that link is that there are such good instructions and pictures for someone new to firewalls.

yes Kathsgrdn always update malwarebytes or any program prior to running the full scan there usually will be new definitions to pick up and running in safe mode is a great idea many times the trojan or malware has processes running that prevent it from being cleaned and in safe mode much less is running. If you need more help just come on back and ask. Also a good idea is to reboot after those scans, many times in fact malwarebytes will say something about clean after reboot.

Maybe the first thing I would do .. Go into the device manager(right click myComputer & select properties) and look for yellow exclamation or red stop errors. While there under Network Adapters you should see two adapters; One will be your wireless adapter and it probably says 802.11b/g/n and manufacturer name. The other network adapter should say something about 'Ethernet adapter and manufacturer name. Double click the Ethernet adapter and then look around for probably a check box that says something about Disable this device. I would disable that ethernet adapter because you aren't using it... that will stop that Network Cable Unplugged message,,, and might possibly be the conflict - if so you might get lucky and your wifi will connect after a reboot. Ummm, what else might you try. The Event logs in your computer management window might give you a hint what's wrong... thats accessable by right clicking myComputer and select Manage. You say you never have added hardware... hardware that would use an irq would be things like a portable hard drive, a flash memory card, anything usb, a pc-card slot device, a seperate monitor. Try unplugging things attached one by one to see if one of those might be causing the conflict. Hopefully its not your wifi card, but if after trying to eliminate the conflict and nothing else hardware wise stops the error message maybe you could disable the wifi adapter in Device Manager and then if the error message instantly goes away that would be a good indication its bumm or maybe rolling back or reinstalling the driver might fix it.

This is the second Malwarebytes scan after I removed everything I could from the first scan results. Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware 1.35 Database version: 1939 Windows 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 04/03/2009 11:04:36 PM mbam-log-2009-04-03 (23-04-36).txt Scan type: Full Scan (C:\:) Objects scanned: 119355 Time elapsed: 47 minute(s), 4 second(s) Memory Processes Infected: 0 Memory Modules Infected: 0 Registry Keys Infected: 15 Registry Values Infected: 0 Registry Data Items Infected: 0 Folders Infected: 0 Files Infected: 8 Memory Processes Infected: (No malicious items detected) Memory Modules Infected: (No malicious items detected) Registry Keys Infected: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\acpi32 (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\acpi32 (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\amd64si (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet002\Services\amd64si (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\amd64si (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\netsik (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\netsik (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\nicsk32 (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\nicsk32 (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\i386si (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\i386si (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\ati64si (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet002\Services\ati64si (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ati64si (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\fips32cup (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. Registry Values Infected: (No malicious items detected) Registry Data Items Infected: (No malicious items detected) Folders Infected: (No malicious items detected) Files Infected: C:\System Volume Information\_restore"415790D9-BB81-41AF-9469-EEC2DB43FA43>\RP997\A0179839.sys (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\acpi32.sys (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\amd64si.sys (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\netsik.sys (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\nicsk32.sys (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\fips32cup.sys (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\i386si.sys (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully. C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\ati64si.sys (Rootkit.Agent) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully.