Wifi Keeps turning off

My wifi radio keeps turning off every 5 minutes or so. Is there a way i can fix this? Its really annoying. The switch for it is turned on and it's not getting flicked accidentally or anything.....Should i reinstall the driver for it?

 

what wireless card? It sounds like the powersave feature gone awry. Best bet is to just turn off powersave features altogether, which usually fixes the annoying dropped connection issues.

 

yep its the power saving feature. check out your thinkpad powermanager and also the settings in control panel

 

I suggest checking the lenovo website for any newer wifi card drivers. If you already have the newest might as well reinstall it. If you use Lenovo's Access Conection software to manage your wireless connections you might want to upgrade that aswell. Make sure to read the readme.txt files that come with lenovo software like Access Connections, print it out if you have to just make sure you have all the other software, drivers, that the upgrade requires. An upgrade in access connections might require you to upgrade: hotkeys software (hotkeys refer to the dedicated lenovo keys on your keyboard), Power Manager software, etc.

I found some info on the forums on lenovo's website very helpful.
http://forums.lenovo.com/lnv/board/message?message.uid=46291#U46291

On installing Access Connections 5
Please Follow these steps carefully

1) Uninstall the Intel Wireless Driver from Control Panel
2) Uninstall Access Connections from Control Panel
3) Restart the system
4) Download and install Hotkey driver
Link to hotkey driver
5) Download and install ThinkPad Power Management driver
Link to ThinkPad Power Management driver
6) Download and install Intel Wireless Driver
Link to Download Intel Wireless driver
Please follow these steps to install the driver
Download and extract the driver
Browse to C:\drivers\WIN\WLANINT2\XP\Apps\x32 and click on iProInst.exe to install the driver
Please note this is a critical step to fix your system
7) Download and install Access Connections

you can either install AC 5.02 or AC 4.52 from the web

Here is a link to AC 5.02 ,will be on the web by mid Sep
AC 5.02 XP

Link will stay active for 2 days

8) restart your system

Test and let me know if it works.

 

Hi bow3022,

This is an excellent feature of ThinkPad's Power Manager that turns off the WiFi radio when it's not accessing the internet after a while. It's a good thing since your usage pattern indicates that you're not connected to the internet all the time, and turning off the radio helps your machine conserve battery power.

This occurs because the "Wireless Adaptor setting" in the various power schemes are set to "Maximum Power Savings" which turns off WiFi radio after a few minutes to maximise battery endurance.

All you need to do is bring up your ThinkPad's Power Manager by clicking on the green battery icon on your taskbar and launch the Power Manager.

1. Create and name a New Power Plan.

2. Click the following buttons in sequence: "Edit" followed by "Next", then "Advanced" consecutively to drill down into the menus.

3. You should see the "Wireless Adaptor setting" drop box option.

4. Choose anything other than "Maximum Power savings".

5. Save your settings.

If your WiFi radio cuts off sooner than you like, you repeat the above and escalate up.

Do note that choosing "Maximum Performance" from the "Wireless Adaptor setting" keeps your WiFi radio ON all the time, consuming power even when you're not accessing the internet. Not prudent if you're away from power sockets for long periods.

Good luck.

 

That setting in the power manage fixed it. Thanks thinkpad.forever!

 

You're welcome.

 

i thought it worked but i guess it didnt. It stayed on for a while then disconnected, now its doing the same thing over and over again.

And installing the hotkeys, etc etc. Thats for xp? I apologize i forgot to mention i have windows vista home basic.

 

If you are using Vista you still need the Hotkey driver.

From Lenovo's website > Support > Drivers and Downloads
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?sitestyle=lenovo&lndocid=MIGR-67283

Before installing ThinkVantage Access Connections 5.31 on Windows Vista, it is required to install the following software. Refer to the README file of each software package for installation instructions.
- Lenovo System Interface Driver for Windows Vista, version 1.00.0702 or later
- ThinkPad Power Management Driver for Windows 2000/XP/Vista, version 1.42 or later
- Hotkey driver for Windows Vista, version 2.08.2008 or later

 

i didn't install the access connections.

I uninstalled and reinstalled the wireless card drivers, hotkey and power manager drivers and it works good.