Wireless cannot connect: “No Connections Available”

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I have a problem. The wireless stopped working on my Dell 1745 Studio laptop (Windows 7 Home Premium). I have no problem when I am connected by ethernet cable to the router.

It worked fine until recently, now it shows “No connections are available” even though my other 2 computers see the wireless connection (at home and other places) and have no trouble connecting to them…

I suppose it is possible that the wireless adaptor has died, but Device Manager says (in Network adaptors) that the “Dell 1520 Wireless-N WLAN mini-card” in my laptop is working properly.

I have a vague memory of changing some setting to make my network system more secure, but cannot recall what, if anything, I did, or whether that change coincided with the time the wireless stopped working… (You can bet from now on I am going to document everything I change.)

I’ve checked everything I can think of…
— “Use proxy…” is not checked.
— IPCONFIG /ALL shows all adapters with “media disconnected” (if that is relevant).

Any ideas of where I should start in order to diagnose the problem and get m wireless back up…?

thanks in advance, Dee

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Is Wi-Fi enabled with Fn + F2?

Bruce

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Hi Bruce, Yes, forget to mention that obvious thing, but the WiFi is turned on via the F2 Fn key – doesn’t seem to make any difference…

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Try deleting the wireless card in device manager and restarting the laptop.

That will re-install the drivers for it and hopefully rule out any network changes you may have made.

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Thanks Browni,
I had already tried that — sorry, another thing I had already done that I forgot to mention – what haven’t I tried?)

Deleting the wireless adapter and rebooting had no effect…

BUT… I was reading one of the recent postings about the father trying to get his daughter’s laptop wireless running while she was away at college and one of the suggestions was to check for newer drivers. So I did that and found new drivers specifically for Windows7 – several revisions newer than my previously current drivers.

And, lo and behold, that did the job !! The old drivers had been working fine, but then I got a new Hitron DOCSIS modem from my cable company when I upgraded to a faster Internet speed, and that must have “broken” the old wireless. I diod not relaize it at the time since I am always connected by ethernet cable at home. But when I went away on a trip recently and needed wireless was when I recognized that it no longer worked…

Thanks to all for the suggestions — all seems fine now by updating the drivers…

David

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Great at last you fixed the issue by yourself. Updating the device drivers to latest version is a good practice and avoid most of the device performance issues.

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