Access Connections and Intel wireless card issues SOLVED
Posted: Thu Mar 12, 2009 4:59 am
Hi - this isn't a plea for help; I wanted to post about an issue I had which I've managed to fix. Maybe no-one else has this problem, or maybe everyone here would know how to fix it anyway. But it might still help someone, and I'm in the mood for sharing 
I had an issue on my X41 where my wireless worked fine only if I used Windows XP (Wireless Zero Configuration) to manage it. Access Connections complained about drivers not being installed properly and F5 refused to turn the card on, always showing it as powered off, even when I was happily surfing the internet via my wireless LAN using Windows to manage it.
There've been many posts on these forums about this issue, which is why I'm posting my results back. I followed some of the recommendations (usually involving many, many reboots and getting the order of software installation correct). As my X41 isn't the fasted booter in the world this seemed to take hours.
The solution ... don't worry about which order you install the software. It's an Intel bug.
When uninstalling and/or upgrading the wireless LAN card drivers (2915abg in my case), it messes up the properties of the wireless network, specifically the "WLAN Tranport" Intel protocol.
The fix is to go to the properties of your Wireless Network Connection and under the general tab you'll see stuff like "File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks", "Internet Protocol (TCP/IP)" etc. One of these is probably a protocol called "WLAN Transport". If it's there, remove it. Save/apply and reboot.
After rebooting, add "WLAN Transport" back again. In the "General" tab, click "Install...", select "protocol" and "Intel". Mine gave me two options both called "WLAN Transport" but one had a version number after it. I picked that one. There's no configuration, just add the protocol. Reboot.
All should now work fine. Access Connections (in my case 5.20) needs the WLAN Transport protocol to be able to interface with the drivers (in my case 2915ABG version 9.0.4.39).
If you check in "services" the three Intel ones should be automatic and running. In my case, prior to performing my fix, one of them wasn't running and had "WLAN Transport" as a pre-requisite.
I had an issue on my X41 where my wireless worked fine only if I used Windows XP (Wireless Zero Configuration) to manage it. Access Connections complained about drivers not being installed properly and F5 refused to turn the card on, always showing it as powered off, even when I was happily surfing the internet via my wireless LAN using Windows to manage it.
There've been many posts on these forums about this issue, which is why I'm posting my results back. I followed some of the recommendations (usually involving many, many reboots and getting the order of software installation correct). As my X41 isn't the fasted booter in the world this seemed to take hours.
The solution ... don't worry about which order you install the software. It's an Intel bug.
When uninstalling and/or upgrading the wireless LAN card drivers (2915abg in my case), it messes up the properties of the wireless network, specifically the "WLAN Tranport" Intel protocol.
The fix is to go to the properties of your Wireless Network Connection and under the general tab you'll see stuff like "File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks", "Internet Protocol (TCP/IP)" etc. One of these is probably a protocol called "WLAN Transport". If it's there, remove it. Save/apply and reboot.
After rebooting, add "WLAN Transport" back again. In the "General" tab, click "Install...", select "protocol" and "Intel". Mine gave me two options both called "WLAN Transport" but one had a version number after it. I picked that one. There's no configuration, just add the protocol. Reboot.
All should now work fine. Access Connections (in my case 5.20) needs the WLAN Transport protocol to be able to interface with the drivers (in my case 2915ABG version 9.0.4.39).
If you check in "services" the three Intel ones should be automatic and running. In my case, prior to performing my fix, one of them wasn't running and had "WLAN Transport" as a pre-requisite.