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Wireless stopped working after Windows 7 upgrade

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Mayonati

Member
Joined
Oct 31, 2008
Hi all,

I've recently bought a new laptop. It's a Sony Vaio VGN-FW41E. It was installed with Windows Vista and although I didn't test the wireless before formatting it, the little "Wireless" light on the front next to the wireless switch worked fine (turning on when the switch was on, and off when it was off).

After upgrading to Windows 7 I can't seem to get the Wifi to work - Pushing the switch one way or the other makes no difference, the light doesn't come on. The drivers seem to be installed fine, I've also run windows update and downloaded the latest drivers direct from Sony (from their Windows 7 version page) and installed them - windows says that the drivers are installed correctly.

I've also disabled the firewall and everything else that might be causing problems. I've checked the WLAN Autoconfigure service, and it's on. Windows can't seem to find a wireless network (Wired works fine - I can cable into the same (wireless) router and it works so I know that the router itself isn't the problem. When I run the troubleshooter, Windows suggests to "Turn on the wireless switch on the PC" - I have done so, but the light doesn't show and it doesn't work.

Any ideas how I might fix this?

Oh, also, just to say that I manually configured the connection via Control Panel\Network and Internet\Manage Wireless Networks - entering the SSID, security settings, etc. Still no dice.

In case it's relevent (probably not as this seems to be a laptop, rather than AP, problem), the router broadcasts it's SSID, I *do* use MAC filtering but I've added both the wired and wireless MAC to the router's table (and I've triple-checked that they are correct; also it allows the connection via wired) and I use WPA-2 encryption using AES.
 
Most laptops have Intel wireless chipsets. You can find which one you have (if it is an Intel) with the tool here, and then download the appropriate driver from the same page. If the issue is with the button for turning wireless on and off, you probably need to look for a driver from Sony for ACPI hotkeys or some such.
 
My laptop has a blue FN wireless key for F2 as well as the wireless switch on the front. I can have the wireless switch turned on and if I accidentally hit the FN + F2 combo it will turn my wireless off. This caused a scare for me before, maybe it's what problem you're having.
 
petteyg359 - Thanks, I took a look at that and ran the scan, apparently it's the "Intel(R) WiFi Link 5100 AGN Version: 13.0.0.107"
Unfortunately although I downloaded the driver and it *seemed* to install, I'm still having wireless problems, same as before

Also, I forgot to point it out before but my bluetooth drivers have not installed - I've ran the installer which seemed to succeed, but they are not on the system and despite running loads of "Driver scanner" type apps, none of them have seen my bluetooth device (which used to show up on Vista)

Sulla - Nope, none of my F keys have a wireless option, thanks for the idea though :)

Any more ideas people?
 
Also, I forgot to point it out before but my bluetooth drivers have not installed - I've ran the installer which seemed to succeed, but they are not on the system and despite running loads of "Driver scanner" type apps, none of them have seen my bluetooth device (which used to show up on Vista)

I had the same problem on my Asus laptop. On the pre-installed Vista HP, it had onboard bluetooth. I did a clean install of Vista U (I only have one Windows 7 key, and am using it on my desktop) and the bluetooth isn't there anymore, and the drivers from the Asus site won't install.
 
It's really odd.. Luckily I made a note of the driver model before I formatted (ALPS UGPZ9 BCM2046) but most of the sites that I've found for download are fake/spyware types and the one legit download I found.. Well, upon trying to install, Windows said that "a much later version of bluetooth software was found, so setup cannot continue". But there aren't! Gah
 
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