PUSBLANXAD01 AD-LAN01 PC USB Network Adapter Driver Blues

On Amazon.com, I bought an item described as "NEW USB to LAN RJ45 Ethernet 10/100 Network Adapter Card."  The purpose was to see if I could use USB to connect to the Internet, where I did not have a working ethernet connector for the usual cable connection.  The device was cheap -- about $7 with shipping -- and when I plugged it in, it lit right up.  The problem was, contrary to the ad, it did not come with a driver CD.  And since the Windows Vista computer I wanted to use it on was, of course, not able to go online, I could not download and install the drivers automatically.

The device came in a little box with a label on it that read, "16254 PUSBLANXAD01[J133] PC USB Network Adapter."  The UPC product number on the box was 8-77083-03542-3 (or 877083035423).  The device itself had a label that said, "Model:  AD-LAN01."  Both stickers said, "Made in China."

Buy.com had a review that I didn't see before buying, in which the buyer said that s/he had the same problem -- no driver CD.  That Buy.com webpage said the item was made by eForCity.  I went to the eForCity webpage.  It had no link for driver downloads.  There were several reviews.  Some said they had no problem; some said it didn't work.  I wondered whether it mattered if you used it on Windows XP or Vista.  I plugged it into a WinXP machine and tried that.  Windows recognized it as a "USB Network Controller," but the Found New Hardware Wizard said, "The wizard could not find the software on your computer for USB Network Controller."  I chose the option of connecting and searching for the software on the Internet -- using the existing ethernet connection on that computer to do so.  A minute later, it said, "Cannot Install This Hardware.  The hardware was not installed because the wizard cannot find the necessary software."  I verified that my online connection was working OK, tried again, and got the same thing.

Some of these reviews said something about downloading drivers from other websites.  Good way to get a virus.  I tried a search for AD-LAN01 instead of the previous search for PUSBLANXAD01.  That turned up only a couple of hits, one of which was a thread on which the person said they had tried downloading drivers and still had no luck, and another of which was a driver download page for some kind of graphics device that was apparently also called the AD-LAN01.  I tried a search for the UPC.  This gave me a post from someone who said the CD did come with theirs, but it was nonreadable and they had to reinstall the driver weekly.  So, OK, toss it in the parts box and maybe someday I'll find a computer that it works on.  Junk.  Should have bought a brand-name product.  And that was my next step.