Before giving up with the new driver, it would be better try to troubleshoot.
Which was the driver conflicting? Or program?
As I mentioned in my original post, the problem is related to my Dell wireless card driver and its associated driver utility which is available within Control Panel. This driver has caused no problems with any other application so I see no reason to suspect that it suddenly needs to be replaced. My problem exists when Avast version 5.1.864 is installed, and goes away when it is uninstalled. Since a couple of other users have confirmed this problem on their own Dell laptops with the same card and driver, logic tells me that something changed in Avast 5.1.864 that is causing this issue. Version 5.0.677 exhibits no such behavior so I'm inclined to stay with that version until Alwil acknowledges the bug in the new version and fixes it.
Here is a link to the post I'm referring to:
http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=68625.0Aside from the tests I described in that original post, what other troubleshooting actions would you suggest?