- Joined
- Feb 6, 2009
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Ok so I'm apologizing upfront for not being as informed as everyone else here.
So I have an issue with my WLAN going missing. It had been working fine for the 2 years since I bought the laptop, and suddenly, it has vanished.
Abnormal activity log:
So I use the wireless at college, and ethernet at home. I was using it ok yesterday at school, and then came home and hooked the ethernet for my DSL connection. After studying and homework, I logged into my favorite MMO and found out it had a patch. Yaay new content, so download, patch, login, go to the main city. Many crashes later (absolutely everyone was there getting the new quests... two steps, laaaag, two more steps, laaaag, crash, repeat) so I decided "Perhaps if I free some CPU it'll work better." So I referenced www.liutilities.com for a list of non-essential processes, one of which was the HP Wireless Assistant (I forgot the process name), thinking "Hey, they come back with restart right?" Freeing the CPU a little actually helped, didn't think much of it, turned of computer, went to sleep. Next day: at school, library, start up computer... can't connect. The WLAN:ON/OFF taskbar item wasn't there, the WLAN switch was OFF regardless of where I switched it to, and it wasn't showing as a connection in Network Connections. Typically if it's switched off, it still shows in the taskbar and Network Connections (as disconnected) but it's... just not there.
I went to Device Manager, and I couldn't find the hardware device at first, but when I clicked Show Hidden Devices, it showed up. Apparently "This Device is working properly" so I guess theoretically windows sees it and it's working. Next stop: Control Panel. The "HP Wireless Assistant" icon does exactly nothing when I click it. Next stop: msconfig. The "Wireless Autoconfig" is enabled and stopped. Er... ok... at this point I'm flabbergasted about what's going on.
The first thing I did was reinstall the drivers for the WLAN. No dice. So I went online (at home, via ethernet) and downloaded the latest WLAN drivers for my device. No change. Update BIOS. No change. Download HP Wireless Assistant and (re)install. No change.
Er ok... back to msconfig. Diagnostic startup. Click off everything except network or wireless related things (as best as I could tell, I'm no expert), restart... Wireless Autoconfig is still "Stopped" and no WLAN. Ok, click off everything EXCEPT for the wireless autoconfig, restart... it still registers as enabled and stopped.
Bah. So at this point I'm suspecting "Wonked startup" and "Wonked/corrupted unknown file" but without the knowledge of how to go about investigating and ultimately fixing it. Will post SIW and whatnot when I can figure that program out.. in the meantime:
OS: Windows XP Media Center edition
Broadcom 802.11 b/g WLAN
So I have an issue with my WLAN going missing. It had been working fine for the 2 years since I bought the laptop, and suddenly, it has vanished.
Abnormal activity log:
So I use the wireless at college, and ethernet at home. I was using it ok yesterday at school, and then came home and hooked the ethernet for my DSL connection. After studying and homework, I logged into my favorite MMO and found out it had a patch. Yaay new content, so download, patch, login, go to the main city. Many crashes later (absolutely everyone was there getting the new quests... two steps, laaaag, two more steps, laaaag, crash, repeat) so I decided "Perhaps if I free some CPU it'll work better." So I referenced www.liutilities.com for a list of non-essential processes, one of which was the HP Wireless Assistant (I forgot the process name), thinking "Hey, they come back with restart right?" Freeing the CPU a little actually helped, didn't think much of it, turned of computer, went to sleep. Next day: at school, library, start up computer... can't connect. The WLAN:ON/OFF taskbar item wasn't there, the WLAN switch was OFF regardless of where I switched it to, and it wasn't showing as a connection in Network Connections. Typically if it's switched off, it still shows in the taskbar and Network Connections (as disconnected) but it's... just not there.
I went to Device Manager, and I couldn't find the hardware device at first, but when I clicked Show Hidden Devices, it showed up. Apparently "This Device is working properly" so I guess theoretically windows sees it and it's working. Next stop: Control Panel. The "HP Wireless Assistant" icon does exactly nothing when I click it. Next stop: msconfig. The "Wireless Autoconfig" is enabled and stopped. Er... ok... at this point I'm flabbergasted about what's going on.
The first thing I did was reinstall the drivers for the WLAN. No dice. So I went online (at home, via ethernet) and downloaded the latest WLAN drivers for my device. No change. Update BIOS. No change. Download HP Wireless Assistant and (re)install. No change.
Er ok... back to msconfig. Diagnostic startup. Click off everything except network or wireless related things (as best as I could tell, I'm no expert), restart... Wireless Autoconfig is still "Stopped" and no WLAN. Ok, click off everything EXCEPT for the wireless autoconfig, restart... it still registers as enabled and stopped.
Bah. So at this point I'm suspecting "Wonked startup" and "Wonked/corrupted unknown file" but without the knowledge of how to go about investigating and ultimately fixing it. Will post SIW and whatnot when I can figure that program out.. in the meantime:
OS: Windows XP Media Center edition
Broadcom 802.11 b/g WLAN
