E520 cannot detect wifi network

[aus1]

Hi,

I am trying to connect my E520 to a wireless router. The router isn't connected to a modem, it will just be used so I can transfer files between two wireless devices. The wifi router is functioning properly as I can cannect to it with the wifi on my phone. However my laptop doesn't even see any wifi networks to connect to. The wirless "radio" button (F9) is on.

What happens.....

- There us is no visible wifi network.

- I can connect and access the router and its settings using the ethernet cable.

- 1st method - When I go to "Network and Sharing Center" I select "Setup a new connection or network". From the box that appears I select "Setup a new connection". The next box asks me to choose a wireless router from the list and informs me it may take up to 90sec for a router to show up. However no routers show up at all even after 30min.

-2nd method -  I go to "Network and Sharing Center" I select "Setup a new connection or network". From the box that appears I this time select "Manually connect to a wireless network". Thsi time I get a box with an error "An unexpected error occured". It doesn't give any more information than this and I have looked in the logs and though I don't know what I am looking for nothing jumps out.

-3rd method - I go to "Manage wireless networks" and click on the "add" button. The box that appears asks me to choose between "Manually create a network profile" or "create an ad hoc network". Choosing either of these reslts in the same "unexpected error" with no information.

Things I have tried:

- Uninstalled the wireless card drivers and installed the latest ones. (device manager says device is working properly).

- let windows try and update the driver.

- Turned off my firewall and internet security and tried again.

- Disabled power management for the wireless card.

- Physically checked the card in the base of the laptop - all seems ok.

I am not network savy though I have set them up before. I haven't any other ideas. Any one able to help?

Win7 64bit Home Premium

Zonelalarm Extreme

D-link DIR_600 wifi router.

thanks in advance.

regards

Laurie

[lead_org Microsoft MVP Contributor]

is your wireless card detected in the hardware manager?

[aus1]

Hi lead-org.

Yes the device manager shows the wireless card and gives it's status as "this device is working properly".

Cheers
laurie

[aus1]

Further information-
I went through the Trouble-shooting routine within Win 7 for the wireless card and obtained the following report:

"There might be a problem with the driver for the Wireless Network Connection adapter.
Windows couldn't automatically bind the IP protocol stack to the network adapter."

Maybe this will help narrow down the problem
To confirm, I have uninstalled the driver and re-installed from the manufacturer's website twice.

cheers,
Laurie

[lead_org Microsoft MVP Contributor]

I have a hunch that this could be a hardware failure of the wireless card.

Try a Linux Live CD.

[aus1 · Accepted solution]

Thanks again lead_org. I was starting to suspect the same. However I did a couple of hours research on the new info I got from the Trouble-shooting and discovered that it is Zonealarm that is the culprit. When the driver is updated ZA for some reason blocks the new driver and even disabling ZA will not get it to work. I ended up uninstalling ZA and then reinstalling and it picked up the new driver and now everything works. There may be other ways of getting ZA to re-scan the drivers and pick it up that way but I didn't find it. As a matter of interest this fault occurs with Kaspersky too. Thanks for your help and perhapas others will find this info of use.

regards,
Laurie

[z80]

I'd like to say thanks aus1 for bothering to come back and post the fix you found. I've been searching since a driver update at midday took out my wireless connectivity. Couldn't understand it at all. Zone alarm, I would never have thought of it.

[g3j]

More thanks from the future to aus1 for posting the relationship with this issue and zone alarm

To help the search engines index this better (took me ages to find) I'll re-state the problem and fix.

Problem:

a) wifi shows as on and functional but detecting no networks, or

b) the wifi adapter shows as on in the network connections but as off in windows 8 networks side bar

Fix:

a) uninstall zone alarm & re-boot

b) uninstall old wifi drivers + reboot and then install newest from the manufacturer' website and reboot.