can a bad wireless card stop the internet

Okay my computer is a Hp compaq nc6320 and of late its been a complete annoyance.

In august time I had my computer on standby and drove home frrom my brothers, had to break sharply at the roundabout and I'e been paying for it since.

My computer simply did not want to know but would operate long enough in safe mode so I could take all my stuff from it.

Since then I've rebooted twice because my internet (I was using wireless/cable depending where in the house I was) would gradually slow to a holt and stop working. Nortons didn't detect a virus so I simply rebooted from scratch.

So for the past 3 months I've been just using my cable even though dad said he got the wireless working again. However for christmas I got a desktop so that needed the cable and started using wireless again on my laptop.

Now, again, my internet has slowed and completely stopped. For the desktop too and that's using the cable. I switch the power off to the internet and on again and now the desktop internet works (woo!)
I havent tried my wireless; I dont want to break itagain.

The reason I'm giving you my computer's life story is that I have certain programms I want on my computer each time I rebuild. VLC for one, itunes skype, messenger. This time round I also downloaded something that would act as an alarm clock but it didn't do what I wanted to I uninstalled it with a bit of trouble.

So my question is...Whats with my computer? Will it be my internet card? Or something I keep putting on to it?

Thanks!

 

I am 99.9% sure it is your wireless router, I would suggest buying a new one