WLAN / WIFI Card Issues

I've had my XP 150 four three months and everything worked perfectly until this evening. Stock bios (3114) and Atheros driver. I have never had any Wifi disconnect, slow, or inactive after sleep issues on either XP or Vista Home. And this evening when I'm watching streamed video on it all the sudden Wifi is gone, the card cannot be detected by Vista, the driver doesn't even show up in the Hidden devices list. I rebooted to both XP and Vista and nothing is there, I had to do a complete shut down to get it back just like everybody else. I really think this is a combination of hardware and driver issue because the card tend to get way hotter than any other cards I've seen. My problem occurred when I have streamed video for 5 and half hours on battery and plugged it in to charge, I guess it had something to do with the issue.

 

I had this problem occur to me for the first time ever as well tonight. I too was running low on battery (around 40%) and I don't remember ever getting that low (I usually plug it back and keep it topped up as much as I can in case I need it for longer than anticipated).

So maybe it's a combination of hardware with lower power? Anyway, I had to "uninstall" the wireless adapter and re-install it for it to work again.
Rebooting didn't help me.

 

New to the forum but wanted to share my recent experience. I purchased 2 aspire one's (120G, 1G Ram, XP) for my two kids for xmas. I opened these up to configure for xmas morning. Remember, these are two identical units right out of the box. Each unit has bios version 3305 and wireless driver 7.6.0.224. One unit is running perfectly. The wireless connection works just like any other laptop I have or have used. The second unit has been nothing but a pain. The typical symptoms listed on here - dropped connection, slow connection, after standby, and even on initial boot. I personally feel it is faulty hardware that can be hit or miss. I'm not here to get into that. I spent a couple of days trying suggestions on here and then I quit. A new replacement is on the way and hopefully the odds will be in my favor with it.

 

My wife has had her A110L since early September and the wifi has behaved just fine until very recently. In the last couple of weeks, the wifi has kept dropped and only a power off and back on gets it back. Reboot doesn't help.

When it's in the failed state, dmesg logs say that there isn't a card in the slot and lspci doesn't show the wireless card. So, the hardware is dying big time and dropping off the PCI bus. Do others using Linux see the same?

I reflashed to BIOS v3309 last night as people have reported this as a fix. We'll see in a couple of days.

As everything was fine for over three months, and as we haven't done any software updates since mid-Sept (if it ain't broke ...) I really do think this is hardware dying and that we'll have to organise a swap-out.

Ian

 

Ah, there is one change I made a few weeks back that I ought to mention. I switched our AP from WEP (yes, I know!) to WPA.
Ian

 

I was unable to recreate the problem and I don't want to do anything to alter it just yet. Hopefully it'll stay that way.

 

Flashing this new BIOS has taken us from 1-2 power cycles a day due to the wifi card disappearing to not a single one since. If it lasts like this until the weekend, then I'm happy that the 3309 BIOS "a good thing".

Ian

 

Bum. It died again this AM. :-( :-(

dmesg says -
pciehp: No new device found
pciehp: Cannot add device 0x3:0
pciehp: Card not present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card not present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card not present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card not present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card not present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card not present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card not present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card not present on Slot(0003_0002)
pciehp: Card present on Slot(0003_0002)

lspci gives -
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel 945GME Express Memory Controller Hub (rev 03)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel 945GME Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)
00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Mobile 945GM/GMS, 943/940GML Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) HD Audio Controller: Realtek ALC662G/268 (rev 02)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 02)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 2 (rev 02)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 3 (rev 02)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 4 (rev 02)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 02)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 02)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 02)
00:1d.3 USB Controller: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 02)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller (rev 02)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev e2)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel 82801GBM (ICH7-M) LPC Interface Bridge (rev 02)
00:1f.2 IDE interface: Intel 82801GBM/GHM (ICH7 Family) SATA IDE Controller (rev 02)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel 82801G (ICH7 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 02)
02:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek RTL8102E PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller (rev 02)

Both of these look very wrong, like the wifi PCI device has gone AWOL, or keeps bouncing in and out.

Hardware problem?

Ian

 

Recently my wife's AAO running Linpus Lite started to drop the WLAN connection after waking from sleep and the only thing to cure it was a shutdown then start back up again. I looked at the network order and moved the WLAN above the LAN just like the quoted post back in August, and touch wood all weekend there have been no problems

I will update if the problem arises again.

Just lifted the lid on the AAO and just because I said it looked good it decided to disable the network! I should have kept quite.

 

Wifi is already above LAN for me. And I must be stupid, as I can't see any button/option to change the order.
Ian

 

Up/Down will change the order:


Shot at 2008-12-21

 

Ah, thanks, I missed the right click option.

Have now moved wireless to the top. Let's see how it goes.

Ian

 

Well...one nite I am my bed surfing and the next day I get up to boot up my computer and to connect....I get a red X on my wireless connection with "No wireless network found in ranage" Please configure WZC (Wireless Zero Connection). So...I start looking on here and looks like I am not alone. Well I go disable the WZC and it and enable and both does nothing to reslove the problem. I go to my desktop and power off my modem and netgear router nothing. I go and rename my wireless connection still nothing.

I think acer should....do a recall on these laptops and give the paying customers a FREE upgrade (really).
When is acer going to get this fixed?


Thanks,

John

 

There do seem to be a variety of problems, but the one where the wifi hardware goes AWOL on both Windows and Linux is the most nasty. A full power-off and reboot seems to be the only fix.
Ian

 

I've been having occasional wifi drops with my new Linpus Acer. It is fresh out of the box a week ago. I have not updated any of the software. The problems have occurred seemingly randomly. Everything working smoothly until suddenly I get a "disconnected from network" message. My wifi LED turns off at the same time. In this state the card is unresponsive to the physical switch as well as all software commands. Rebooting or a sleep/wake cycle brings it right back up. A weird and frustrating glitch. Then I read this post:

I don't know if it helps, but I had the same problem as you. I found out that the wifi-connection always breaks, when I lift up the AA1 holding it on the front side (or just "pushing" the case a little bit stronger on the plastic between the arrow-buttons and the wifi switch)..
When I then turned off the broken wifi, suspended the computer, woke it up again and turned on wifi - then it worked without any problem until ne next lift or "push"..


I tested this theory by pushing on the casing near the wifi switch and immediately I lost the card. At least some of us are having hardware issues. The Atheros card is either defective or maybe not properly installed.

I'm glad that did extensive reading about this problem before trying any of the various software fixes. In my case the problem is all hardware. Check this first!!
Fortunately I'm still under warranty........

 

My question to you,
What 4965AGN card did you purchase?
A quick skim of ebay offerings made me realize that this may not be as simple as I first thought:
there are cards made specifically for DELL laptops ("Won't work in your IBM or HP!"), ones specifically
made for IBM ("Won't work in your DELL or HP!") or made for HP - you get the idea. I saw one that was
pulled from an ASUS G2 laptop ... maybe that one is "generic" and therefore works? I have no clue.
So what did you get?

Thanks, Hans

 

I've had the replacement unit for almost a week. It runs like a champ. I really think it is instability in the wireless hardware. From what I've read, I could go a month and it will crap out. Who knows.

 

The only solution that I've found with Vista / WLAN issues is to replace the card with a new one. I bought an Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG card and installed it today with no problems whatsoever. It's very simple to install and can be done by a monkey. I bought mine on eBay for $15 with shipping so they are pretty cheap to. You just want to make sure you get the mini pci express version and not the pci express or mini pci. You might also go ahead and install the extra 1GB of memory since there are just a few more screws to pull while your in there.