Vista - Switching from wireless to wired on desktop

Hello,

I have been scouring the internet for about 2 hours now, and I am looking for someone to be my salvation. I recently purchased a hp pavilion desktop with Vista 64bit and it also came with a wireless card and capabilities installed. I recently moved into my dorm room for college from home, and I wanted to set it up wired in my dorm room. I plugged in the cable and I cannot get any connections for it, but my friend's computer is working fine and I am completely confused by the situation.

Could someone please give me some advice on the matter? I am so lost, nothing has worked so far. Thanks in advance.

Do you have an Ethernet card installed or maybe it's part of the motherboard, have a look in Device Manager and that should tell you if you have one and what the present state it is showing.

Also is there a port of the back of the computer that looks like a telephone connector but is larger, I can't remember the name of it now think it's something line RJ45 it might have the name Ethernet above it.

I suggest checking in device manager to make sure your network driver is functioning properly.

You could always use the name of what you find to go to the provider's site and download the latest one.