Thinkpad x40 Wireless Driver will not connect with wireless card

[TravelBug]

I am having great difficulty trying to find the correct driver for my Thinkpad x40.  I've tried all the choices on the Lenovo site for the x40 but all of them still don't show up under the Network Adapter list in the Device Manager.  The Ethernet driver worked with no problem. The Network Controler under Other Devices continually displays with the big yellow question mark after installation of the Setup.exe file.

I recently reformatted my laptop with a copy of Windows XP, not the one that came with the laptop.  I don't have any of the orignial software unfortunately.  After the installation I began the process of installing all of the drivers.  The only one that does not work is the Wireless driver.  Before I reformatted the hard drive I had no issues with wireless so it's hard to believe that the card could have gotten damaged.   Do you think reformatting the OS would damage the wireless card?

Anyway, I am at my end of my rope and don't know what else to do?  Can anyone help me please? 

[ajkula66 Guru]

Welcome to the forum!

The "network controller" is your missing wireless card...and I'm going to take a stab in the dark that it's an Intel 2200BG:

http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc/pccbbs/mobiles/6hwc05ww.zip

After downloading it, you might have to go into C>Drivers>Win>Wlanint and run the setup file from there.

What's the 7-character model number of your ThinkPad, BTW?

[TravelBug]

Thank you George for responding. 

I only know part of the model number.  It's 2382-XX1.  I don't have the key to my Utrabase and so can't see the bottom of my laptop to get the entire number.  I used a tool to determine the above number.

I've downloaded your zip file, extracted the files, ran the file (6hwc05ww.exe), and the ran the Autorun.exe from C:\DRIVERS\Win\WLANINT, but still no wireless ...

Any other advice will be so appreciated.  Thanks again. 

[ajkula66 Guru · Accepted solution]

Well, that leaves pretty much just one more option:

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=MIGR-59438

Same business, C>Drivers>Win>Wlanint

Good luck.

[TravelBug]

George,

Thank you, thank you, thank you....I can't believe after trying so many drivers over these past few days, but this last one you suggested worked like a charm!  I am up and run wirelessly again.  How did you know that would do it?  

Anyway, thank you. I will save the installation package for the future should I need it again.

Tracy

[andyP Community SuperMod]

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TravelBug wrote:. 

How did you know that would do it?  

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If George doesn't know it - chuck the thing in the trash

[Hoge]

I am having a similar problem, but none of this works  My X40 is a 2386-E9U.  I had installed a Kingspec SSD, installed Win 7, updated BIOS, downloaded every conceivable driver from Lenovo, and all worked well for several months.  A few weeks ago the SSD died--or something.  Win 7 would hang on booting and I would get the infamous "0xc00000e9" Error.  Removed the SSD, restored the old hd to default, installed Win 7 fresh on that.  Reinstalled all drivers.  Everything works fine--except the Wireless (and the audio, which I haven't bothered with).  I re-did the BIOS update.  I re-downloaded all the possible wireless drivers from Lenovo. I tried 1rwc89ww.exe .  I went to C>Drivers>Win.Wlanint. and did "setup".  I did the same thing at Wlannath.  Still nothing.  The wireless icon doesn't light up on the keyboard, and when I press Fn-F5, I get the message "No supported Wireless adapters (802.11, WAN, or Bluetooth) are installed in this system".  I even looked around the base, recalling that my X60s has a wireless switch.  I recall that when I first installed the SSD and Win 7 I had to mess with the wireless to get the right setting, but it was nothing like this.  I have read and re-read this thread, have gone back and checked everything a dozen times.  Am I neglecting some stupid basic step?   Any suggestions?

Hoge

[topmahof Community Moderator]

Go to control panel, windows update and look in the optional updates.  See if there's a wireless driver in there. Might be something for audio also.  Your model suggests that you have an intel card in there.  You could try going to intel.com and do their hardware scan and see if it comes up with a driver. That's how I got my wireless driver for windows 7 for the x41's.

You'll probably have to do what George said to do above and run the setup file. It might not automatically install.

My card is intel 2200bg and the driver version is 9.1.1.15, the driver date is 6/23/2006, yours should be the same.

[Hoge]

WOW. Problem solved in about 2 mintues. Many thanks, topmahof. It had nothing to do with updates or anything like that. It was simply the matter of downloading the very 2200bg driver from Intel that you listed. (Audio was solved earlier when I just reinstalled the driver.) Since the wireless label on the base of the x40 didn't say "Intel", I never thought of that; I assumed that it was one of the Thinkpad 802.11xxx drivers listed, and I had tried all of them. Thanks for the help. And it all works very smoothly with Win 7 (and 1.5 G of memory) on this old X40.

Many, many thanks.
Hoge

[topmahof Community Moderator]

Great, I think the x40 was the best one ever made, but I guess I'm a little biased.