Success!
the prob was the wireless access point.
more specifically I had left the WLAN line plugged into one of the 1-4 LAN sockets (left there from router set-up) 
I'm amazed that the PCMCIA card didn't have any issue, where as the internal was completely hosed.
Thanks all for the crash course in wifi set up. I learned a lot today.
. . . and Microsoft UI still sucks!