Stock Wi-fi card to Intel wifi 6200 system freezes

Hi. I just installed a new wifi card the Intel 6200 half card and I am getting frequent freezing. Probably every 40 minutes or so. Does anyone have any idea what I did wrong with the install to cause the freeze ups? It occurs while the system is OC'd on/off. I put back in the old card to see what happens and plan on giving it one more go. Thanks for any guidance ahead of time.

 

Double check all the wires are plugged in and make sure the problem isn't with your router on the software controlling your WiFi card.

 

I have a 6200 and have not experienced these crashes whatsoever. Since the date I installed it, everything has been very smooth. First, follow blab's instructions to make sure that your card is seated correctly and the antenna wires are properly attached. Next, try to verify that your card is genuine. Knockoff hardware is pretty common especially on eBay and may be giving you some issues. As another remedy, try uninstalling the card drivers and reinstalling them back. See if that helps.

 

sorry to bring this thread back, but any updates?
My friend recently got an m11x and installed the 6200 but gets random freezes from time to time. He installed and reinstalled different version of the drivers and all the same. Works like wonders, but then random freezes.

Does he have to uninstall Dell drivers or soemthing?
any help appreciated.
Thanks all!

 

If anyone has any input on this, I'd love it.

I got my R1 about a month ago, installed an Intel 6300 on a fresh install and I am getting random freezes on anything that involves large transfers. I've had a few out at Starbucks, and campus, but I definitely see a lot of them at home (I also do more at home). Tech details below.

Router at home: Asus RT-N16 running DD-WRT
Windows 7 Home Premium fresh install, followed AW recommended driver install order.

I've confirmed the card is seated properly and both cables (I never installed a third antenna, but for $5 more went with the 6300) are connected firmly. Last thing I can think of is that I purchased mine on Amazon, so I'm hopeful it's authentic.

~Most frustrating thing about this seems to be that since it's a freeze I can't see anything in the event log as to why it crashed. I've tried lots of different drivers but all have the same problem.

 

@bschrib
Actually I was over my friends home the entire night trying many things.
I am pretty tech savy, so as you and other found out one main cause is huge data transfers/downloads. I thought it could be driver conflicts so I checked as much diagnostics I could find.
After much frustration of installing/reinstalling drivers, you got to do just like programming and try as much logical possibilities it can.

With the upgrade 6200 it will need more power in areas to maintain that data speed. So I checked the wireless network adapters and everything is set to within specs to main max power.
Then my wife yelled over and said randomly, maybe the computer is slow.
Thinking this was a nonsense remark, I said, heck , lets check your CPU speed. I found out he never over clocked, so I overclocked his CPU in BIOS and restarted and started to test. We did the following tests:

1. Opened up a couple of websites and some youtube videos and let it run for an hour.
PASSED

2. Downloaded 1gb -2gb files at approximately 1.3mb/s and watched it.
After 15-20 minutes
PASSED

3. I downloaded other big files at 1gb-3gb as well as open internet sites and youtube videos.
PASSED

There was no lock up for hours by that time it was late and wife wanted to go home. This worked for me. I will be testing again tonight as I want to get the 6200 for my notebook in the future but not with this slight annoying glitch. Ill try to update shortly.

 

@beomsu21

I'll double-check that my overclock is still enabled, but I believe it should be. It was the first thing I did when my M11x arrived.

The problem is so frustrating because it happens just frequently enough that I'm miffed, but infrequently enough that I can't always get it to happen on command. Some mornings I can transfer 2-5GB's with no issues. Other times I browse reddit and it hangs. There isn't any single item I can point to and say it's the achilles heel.

I'll let you know what I find when I leave work as far as the overclock goes. I believe one other factor may be that my SpeedStep is disabled, though not sure it should impact this.

 

I think I may be having the same issue, however two things confuse me about it, as it only seems to happen at home, and the freezing even occurred when I was on ethernet with no wifi enabled.

I randomly get lockups for 30s or more every ten minutes, but I'm starting to wonder if it's my internet or my router (D-Link 615).

Could it be something to do with the laptop like the wifi card change or is it something on my network's end?

 

Did all of you guys buy the Intel Wi-Fi cards from a reputable seller? I wonder if these are knock-offs or something...

 

Yeah I did, bought mine from Canada Computers, a decent sized Canadian retailer for computer parts, the card was OEM.

 

Ships from and sold by: Amazon.com

I'm sure hoping I can trust them.

 

Yeah I've been running the M11x on just ethernet alone, and the hangups still persist, so I'm not even 100% sure its the wifi card, but I can't figure out what's the exact issue as the internet on my Asus is running fine.

 

I bought two N-6200's off ebay, no issues here. I bought two N-6300 off Amazon, no issues either.

 

There's quite a few of us with the same problem.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/550038-crashing-related-intel-6200-r1.html

No real solution, i tried working with older drivers to see if that would help (mentioned towards the end of the thread above) but i had a random crash during a large transfer yesterday.

 

Hmm, so I uninstalled Chrome and went back to Firefox and the issue doesn't seem to be happening (It occurred here at my friend's house, a first really), so I'm not really sure if it's the card, something else in the laptop or if my laptop doesn't like Chrome.

Any ideas?

 

@Singh31
I feel like that might be a fluke. Admittedly I'm rocking an N-6300, but all the same I didn't even bother to load Chrome with my last re-installation. The problem has carried over between 3 installations so far.

I had tried previously to disable SpeedStep after reading on a forum (I forget where) that there was a network related problem due to having it on, and I thought it was fixed for about half a day, but it turned out to be placebo.

The only other thing I can think is that I do have the Network Optimization that Stevenxowens792 had posted. I guess it's a common thread since it has been applied for all installations that have had this problem.

Perhaps I'll try disabling it (though I'm loathe to, given the benefits of having it) and see if that helps.

Ah and one last thing, not that this appears to help you any, but I've been connected on ethernet at work and have not had a crash while this was the case. Are you sure that you aren't also connected to a wireless network?

 

So I was browsing the other thread euchrid_eucrow posted, and was reading about the person whom had disabled the power saving features on an old intel card and that fixed it. Anyways I went to change mine and found that the only thing I can adjust is allowing the computer to disable the device to save power. I've changed this and will let know if this helps.

One last detail that this made me realize however is that I have a bluetooth module that I ordered with my M11x. Do you others whom have this problem also have Bluetooth?

 

Man.. I'm just spamming this thread, but I'm looking all over the place to figure it out. I was thinking perhaps we should all verify that our symptoms are the same?

When my computer freezes you can tell it's coming about 10 seconds before it actually freezes because any transfer that you have going will stop completely (though oddly enough Windows is unaware of this, as the rate does not change to reflect this) then shortly afterwards (5-10 seconds) the computer will hard lock. Only turning the power off via the power button and rebooting gets any love.

Since there is a cue when this occurs I've tried to see if there was anything I could see happening as it froze but alas no errant process gave itself away. One time I did notice the CPU usage seemed to spike toward 100% (read 96% when it died) but didn't see what process. The other thing that I tried was to kill Explorer thinking it was somehow related, but no dice.

 

Hmm I'll try the the network optimization solution after this game, see if it makes a difference.

Also, with regards to ethernet, I made sure to disable the card and radio switch so that was doubtful.

But it looks like it could be a bad chrome install?

 

I hope it is for you, but as I said I don't even have Chrome installed.

 

Nah my problem is just sometimes chrome will hang on loading something and then my entire internet connection will be stuck loading something even on ethernet.

 

Well I'm not getting any hangups of the sort on firefox, so I'm unsure, other than a slight typing lag, every 30secs or so, but thats bearable.

 

*UPDATE*
I tried basically everything you can do.
Uninstall drivers, reinstall newer and old drivers, change network optimization settings, use CCleaner, check registry, check any hardware conflicts, etc.
My friend thought I was crazy testing his computer for 2 days straight.
I was going to get the intel 6200 card, but now I'll look for other alternatives that are stable. He is also returning his card from Amazon.com where he purchased it as it extremely unstable.

 

I've tried everything I could think of as well. In the end I've sent my 6300 back.

 

@bschrib and all
Since these intel6200/6300 are hit and miss

what are our choices for beter Wi-Fi cards other than intel for the M11x?
If not better, are there just other choices for Wi-Fi cards other than intel?

 

N-6300 working great on my M11X, G73, M17X R2 No issues.

 

Honestly, my card has worked fine since I went back to firefox over Chrome, I'm starting to think it was an issue with Chrome, but I have no idea how to solve that one.

The card works fine for me now, with no freezing and solid rates.

 

I'm beginning to suspect that it may have just been a bad N-6300 card, considering buying another just to try it. flynnaz, where did you buy your card?

With regards to an alternate card I haven't even begun to look yet. I'll take a look sometime later today, but honestly I don't think there are many big players in the half-height PCI-Express mini market.

 

bschrib,
I bought my N-6300's from Amazon.com, they had the best price, free shipping, they came in a brown box, with driver cd, I downloaded the latest driver from Intel. I bought my N-6200's of Ebay. No issues with any of the four cards I bouth, two of each.

Singh31,
I use all three browsers, I doubt it's related in any way to a browser issue.

 

just installed 6200 and now have full bars in my room 4 to 5!!! Can definitely see a difference loading pages, I have not tried a large download yet

 

Glad to hear it worked so well for you drakobear -- It definitely boosted my signal and the connection speeds were far better (went from like 120-144 mbps connections, to 280-300 mbps connections).

@flynnaz
Yeah, I'm hoping it a gamble then, and not just my machine. I bought the last 6300 from Amazon for the same reasons you listed. Guess I'll try again.

 

Well I'm basing it on common factors which led to my hangups, as in why it would only hang in Chrome, and why it works fine in firefox

 

Singh31,
I understand, computers are strange animals sometimes

bschrib,
I hope it works out for you

 

My M11X R1 is freezing after a hour or so of no activity, weird.

 

Yes this happens to me a lot. I run the windows 7 troubleshooter and it seems to fix the problem everytime (but it doesn't say anything as wrong in first place but it gets fixed - weird)

 

Which fix did you use in Win7 Troubleshooter?

 

My r1 also froze with the 6200 purchased from Amazon. This was on a fresh win7 install so driver conflicts shouldn't have been an issue.

Now I'm back on the original wifi card and the lockups have ceased.

 

Right-click the taskbar icon that shows the Wireless bars and click Troubleshoot problems. It should automatically start.

 

I put the stock card back in, now I am getting 300mps... go figure. I did just send it in for a Antenna wire that came loose. Oh well, maybe it was connecting at 150mps because of a bad antenna wire

 

I have been having the same issue as every else on here. I have the M11x and upgraded to the intel 6300. I did purchase and install the third antenna. I have tried different drivers and different antennas. At first I thought I got a defective 6300 because of the freezing, but sent it back to newegg for a replacement and it still freezes. I looked up the specs for the 6300 and it is supposed to operate b/w 0*-60*c. I kept the bottom of the M11x off while i tried to stream a blu-ray, and what do you know. It froze and the 6300 is hot as anything. I would imagine, this is the problem when it comes to downloading small amounts of data compared to large amounts. The card overheats and locks up the computer. Any other thoughts on this?

 

What fixed the freezing for me was installing older Intel drivers, version 13.0.0.107 , driver date 9/15/2009 (according to device manager), and then going into device manager and making sure I unchecked the box for "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power".

edit: forgot to mention that I upgraded from the stock dell card to the intel 6200. and then applied the above fix to stop the freezing. just clarifying

 

Thats what I said problem was for DW1520. Glad to know that it fixed your problem too.

 

Another way to fix the issue with the internet freezing on you is to go to: start -> computer -> system properties -> device manager -> network adapters -> right click network adapter and go to properties -> go to power management tab and uncheck "allow the computer to turn off this device to save power". Good luck.

 

do R2 owners with these card encounter the same problems as the R1 owners?

 

Mine R2 has the same issue, but on dell stock wifi card.
Seems like the lock-up/freeze occurs mostly when I download or do something cause heavy load on my wifi chip. But it's just random, not everytime. And I can't disable wifi to clarify because I can't live without internet X_X

 

Exactly the same problem here on my Envy with Intel 6200. It's driving me crazy as I feel like I've tried absolutely everything. It freezes only on heavy load on the wifi.

Can't believe Intel has made such a piece of crap....

 

uh oh. I might be in this group. Working through driver versions now chasing a fix

 

this.......................

 

That was the first thing I did but didn't help. Been 5hrs on ver 13.5.06 while I was out where it did not freeze. Testing continues.

 

I only have two 5100 cards, and both work perfectly fine. ASUS RT-N16 and Dlink DIR 655 (large area to cover) wifi APs, fresh install of Windows 7.