Key point here is that this device will be installed automatically under Win7 64 and 32 bit systems, according toMicrosoft itself.
My problem was not knowing that at the start. I pursued some blind alleys that wasted a lot of my time & forced me to clean up problems of my own creation. Hawking's web site gives different information depending on what page you're on. One page only gives drivers for WinVista & earlier. Another shows a driver for Win7. Neither one works, and both just cause problems.
My Google search for the drivers provided a lot of bad information.
Finally I went to Microsoft directly, found that I could simply plug in the device, and it was recognized, but as a "RT73 USB Wireless LAN card" according to my Device Manager, not the name Hawking gave it. I run a Lenovo R500 with a Lenovo-provided utility to manage all wireless devices, so once I located the RT73, I was able to configure it correctly & connect to my home wireless router in the same way my built-in wireless adapter did.