problem with WLAN Intel 4965 on Aspire 7720G (Vista Home)

Hello everyone,

Since yesterday WLAN card on my aproximately 1.5 year old Aspire 7720G is not working. I see Unknow network controler in my devices and neither running the driver setup nor choosing update driver and pointing it to the driver setup on disk is working.

I have downloaded the recent drivers from Acer and also Intel website and tried agaian, but unfortnately neither does help. I also run the system recovery and restored the system to the factory settings. But no success again. By the way I noticed that Acer recovery does not place the complete image with drivers, but rather places Vista image and manually installs drivers on first login. And installation of the WLAN Intel 4965 duiring that process faild again.

At this point I run out of the options I knew myslelf and I am in hope that someone experienced and overcome problem similar to mine or possibly can advice on how to handle it...

Thanks in advance!

 

Hi and welcome to the boards.

It does sound like your wifi card has failed/died. Before getting it replaced, I would recommend trying just one more time to install the driver, but this time in safe mode. If that doesn't work, you'll most likely need to get a replacement card which can be purchased relatively cheaply on ebay.

 

Thank you very much!

I also thought that this might be a hardware problem, but one thing that confused me is why do I see "Unknow network controler". This means Vista does see some network device. Are you sure that this is a hardware problem? I was hoping that it is not.

And one more question...
Could you please advice on how to replace this card on a notebook. Can I find a manual or some kind of instructions for doing that. The only manual I have received with my laptop was the user manual, but that is purely user manual and has nothing to do with hardware.

 

Hi,

I have got more information on this case. I noticed that WiFi indicator on my panel is not burning. When I push WiFi button Acer utily provides a message like "WiFi is turned on/off", but indicator is not burning in any case. So I thought that it is quite possible that my litlle son accidentally has turned WiFi off, sometimes he unnoticeably plays with my stuff.

I think driver wil not help until the WiFi is on. Does anyone know how could I turn it on for this model (Aspire 7720G) ?

Alternatively the card may fail. Then the only way is to replace it, but unfortunately I do not have any documentation on how to dissasseble this model. It was not deliverid with the laptop, neither I could find on Acer website. Can anyone help me with this?

 

Do a google search for "acer aspire 7720 service manual blogspot" and you should find the service manual for your laptop.

 

Problem was eventually solved by changing the WLAN card and flashing the motherboard.

Indied old card has died, but simply putting the new WLAN did not completely solve the problem. New card was recognized and installed, but once in 2-3 reboots was disappering. Flashing the motherboard solved the problem completely.

 

I have the same laptop and my wireless sometimes doesn't work... it asks for drivers to be installed for new hardware found - the networking controller.

Well I found that if I switch it off, remove the battery and switch it back on again the problem clears.

I know this wouldn't cure your problem as you found a defective card, but I just thought that maybe it's not just me that suffers the same problem I get.