No modem present

How do I get RHEL 5u5 to recognize that there is a NIC available?

Just installed RHEL 5u5 (because our sofware requires it) on a Dell Latitude E6520 laptop and I was never prompted for the network information.  The installation skipped right over that part.  We have to statically set our NIC parameters, IP address and host name.  We do not use IPv6, only IPv4.

On boot up (when F12 selecting for the boot device) the Internal NIC is listed as an available boot device. 

NIC lights up when cable is plugged in.  Previous windows installation saw and installed the NIC for the network (this was one of several tests to make sure the NIC was good).

Downloaded the 5u5 driver update.  Will that fix the problem I am having?

 Our network is a closed network so I cannot do an update from RedHat.  There is no connection to the outside. So we have to do any updates from disc.  We have never had this problem before so no upodate was or has ever been needed, until now (maybe).

David