T60 wireless issues

I just got my T60ws and I've been having some issues with the wireless connection. When the laptop comes back up after standby the wireless connection doesn't reconnect. When I try to reconnect I doesn't find connections available. If I restart the laptop everything works fine. So far I only notice this while running on battery and it getting to be really annoying. I'm guessing it has something to do with the Thinkvantage Power management but I'm not sure. Any ideas on what is causing this?

 

hey man! I had the same problem.
You are having these problems because thinkvantage manager conflicts with windows wireless manager. So just switch the windows wireless manager off, and use thinkvantage and you will be fine.
This worked for me. Pleaes let me know if it works for you

 

Are you also having audio problems? I experienced something similar with my T60WS, and it was accompanied by skipping audio. This is a known issue but Lenovo seems unable or unwilling to fix it. When I had a T60WS the Lenovo support people seemed totally unable to explain the issue and actually accused me of lying about it (which was a lot of the reason I sent the computer back in disgust).

Read more about the problem at

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=92700&page=2

http://www.suyogdeshpande.net/blog/2006/12/20/ibm-lenovo-3000-n100-so-much-for-repair/

http://blogcritics.org/archives/2006/12/23/161800.php

 

After reading 2 lines of text on the links provided, I quit reading.
Could you tell me what exactly you mean by saying "skipping audio"?

 

I didn't mean to post anti-Lenovo links (if that's your objection to those pages), but they have relevant discussion of the problem. I had a model # 87445-BU T60 WS with Thinkpad (Atheros) a/b/g/n wireless. The sound problem I referred to is a popping and skipping with the audio, whenever I tried to use it while using the wireless connection. It's as though they can't work at the same time. The system exhibited sound popping, skipping, and dropouts whenever I was connected wirelessly, during CD playback, MP3 playback, and even routine system sounds. It was intermittent, but once it started it would continue until I rebooted the machine. It's not a subtle problem, and I can't imagine you'd fail to notice if you were suffering from it (unless you never used the audio).

I noticed the audio problem first, then realized I was also suffering wireless service drops that, as with your machine, would continue until I rebooted.

Based on my experience and what I've read, there seems to be a frequent if not consistent problem with the wireless and audio subsystems on the Lenovo machines. I was nonplussed when the Lenovo techs (who were shockingly rude and ignorant) just couldn't believe that a one-day-old machine was giving me this problem, and ultimately their rudeness and ignorance were probably the biggest reasons I returned the machine and bought a MacBook.

 

I am not objecting any of your pages. Thank you for explaining though. I didn't wan to read those pages just because there was too much text.
In fact, I don't have any of audio problems so far. thank goodness!

 

I'm going to go ahead and revive this thread....

On my T60WS I have a similar issue but only when I unplug my T60, relocate, then plug it back in.

I do believe I have the windows wireless manager switched off but I am not sure if I have done it correctly. Is it possible for someone to quickly scribble some instructions so I know I did this correctly? Thanks. (This will help my troubleshooting before I go ahead and start a new thread whining )

 

Could the wireless not connecting have to do with the "allow XP to turn off device to save power" option in device manager? If you already unchecked that then I don't know.

 

Turning off 'Power Save Mode' in XP's device manager was the solution for me!

My problem:
-I have a t60 87445BU
-When docked (or plugged in) wireless works fine
-When running on battery it can't even detect a single network in the area (at last count, there are 11 wireless networks in my vicinity)
-Best of all: even on battery wireless worked fine yesterday but today it stopped working (only when running on battery)

Solution:
-Control Panel --> System --> Hardware tab --> Device Manager
-Expand 'Network Adapters'
-Right click '11a/b/g/n Wireless...'
-Select 'Properties'
-Select 'Advanced' tab
-Click 'Power Save Mode'
-Set it to 'Off'

This worked for me.

NOTE when strange things happen for absolutely no apparent reason its almost ALWAYS a Windows problem. In this case, the first hint at a solution is that the wireless stopped working only when the machine is running on battery. The second hint is that it worked yesterday but not today, and absolutely nothing happened to the machine in between (i.e. no trauma).

 

Firstly, I created a thread exactly like this a couple months ago here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=98647

Secondly, although Frank's fix helped, it did not entirely solve my problem...

Matt

 

All I had to turn off was "deep smart sleep" for the Ethernet. It seems to have fixed it for me.

 

Here is quote out of my upcoming (hopefully) review:

The wireless out of the box was buggy. Basically, it would loose the connection on a change of power state. I first noticed this when I came out of hibernation. Sometimes the wireless card would not be able to find any wireless. Other times it would find all the networks but the one I had been attached to before hibernation. Other power state changes, such as just unplugging the AC, also seem to trigger the problem sporadically. The other thing I noticed was that upon removing the AC power the wired Ethernet connection would disappear (unless it was physically connected to a CAT5 cable when the AC power was pulled).

It seems fairly clear that this is a software issue because it is intermittent, and rebooting always restores the ability to connect to wireless networks. Further, it seems highly likely that it is related to power management control as it is highly correlated with changes in power states of the laptop.

After discovering this issue I systematically attempted to locate the problem. The windows system error log indicated that a network device had been removed unexpectedly many times. The identifier string for this adapter was that of the Gigabit Ethernet. Setting “Deep Smart Power Down” mode to disabled in the driver appears to prevent the Ethernet from disappearing when the AC power is disconnected from the system. Since disabling “Deep Smart Power Down” I have not noticed any unusual wireless issues, and I am hopeful that this simple change is all that is needed to solve the problem. However, because I could not find a definitive test to reproduce the error, its not possible to know for sure.

It should also be noted that I uninstalled the Access Connections software. However, this did not help alleviate the wireless problems. (Thus if you need or like that software you probably can leave it on). The turning point was disabling “Deep Smart Power Down” on the Intel Pro/1000 PL Network Connection.

(For those wondering I have the latest BIOS, and drivers that that were available on Feb 26th. I do not believe this issue is unique to my system as there are reports of similar issues in the ThinkPads.com forum. I expect this issue will be fixed at some point in the future via a driver update.)

 

Where is this property located exactly? I can't find it in the network adapter settings...

Edit: Never mind for anyone who want to know it's here:

Win+R keys > Type "devmgmt.msc" > open network adapter category > right-click on Intel Pro/1000 PL Network connection > Properties > Advanted tab