Cannot connect to wireless network - LED not coming on

[noetus]

All of a sudden my T60p stopped being able to connect to wireless networks.

I tried uninstalling Access Connections and installing with Windows Wireless instead. No go - I can see the networks, but not connect (I get an error).

I noticed that although I can power the wireless on and off using Fn-F5 the green wireless LED does not come on.

IBM support suggested reinstalling the drivers (power management driver, hot key driver, wireless card driver) but that hasn't helped. They also suggested 'maybe the LED light is broken'. Hmmm.

What should my next steps be?

[Marin85]

Just a side thought: Did you try tweaking the various power management options regarding wifi?

[noetus]

No - as it suddenly stopped working, I didn't consider doing that. I'm not exactly sure what to try with regards to the Power Management options.

[Marin85]

No - as it suddenly stopped working, I didn't consider doing that. I'm not exactly sure what to try with regards to the Power Management options.

1. Device manager -> network adapters -> your wifi card -> Power Management -> uncheck "allow to turn off device to save power"
2. Windows power management -> advanced -> wifi -> power saving -> set to maximum performance
3. There is similar setting in Access Connections as well: advanced settings -> wireless -> power management -> set to max performance
4. Lenovo Power Manager -> Manage settings -> edit profile -> set wifi to max performance

Note that 4 and 2 may overwrite itself and also if you use some default profile of Power Manager, it will probably revert the changes after reboot. For this reason the best thing one can do is to create a new power profile with the needed settings.

Marin

EDIT: Added the exact "path" for AC in 3.

[beGi]

Well, it is a bit strange, and since you've already done few "obvious" steps, maybe you should consider virus scan or system restore...

No go - I can see the networks, but not connect (I get an error).

And the content of the error message is?

[noetus]

Virus scan? Uh-uh, this is a freshly installed system. And nothing indicates there is a virus infection.

The error code is 65537 (Access Connections). The cause of the connection failure is unknown. I had thought it was a hardware issue, but when I called EZ-Serve, the technician told me that if the machine can see networks (which it can) then it is not a hardware failure. He told me that the failure of the green wireless LED to come on must just be because it's broken ( ) and said I should reinstall all the drivers (Access Connections, Wireless Drivers, and Hotkey Driver). I do not know whether to believe him or not and still suspect that this is a hardware issue that is causing the wireless to partially work (can see networks and make connection attempt, but cannot connect and green wireless LED won't come on even though Fn-F5 shows wireless is on). Anyone know?

[Marin85]

If the LED doesn´t appear, it doesn´t necessarily mean that you have some faulty hardware component (but that could be the case too). For instance it took a while for Lenovo to release a Vista x64 driver for the Atheros a/b/g cards which would turn on the wifi LED. Nevertheless, the cards were always working.

Now, onto your issue:

What OS do you have installed (XP or Vista)? Did you consider trying out different versions of the wifi driver? The symptoms you describe look almost the same as an issue I had with my Atheros card under Linux a while back. I was able to see all networks but never to connect to any. It was solved by using an older driver version.

Did you try any of the power management tricks I posted above?

[beGi]

Try to connect via windows interface...

Windows zero configuration must be enabled, also see if dhcp client and dns client are running. Check in Services if those programs are running (control panel>administrative tools>services)...

[noetus]

OK, so I appear to have fixed the problem, thanks very much to your help (Marin85). (BeGi - in my first post, I said the very first thing I tried was connecting directly with Windows.)

This is on x86 Vista.

I followed your advice (Marin85) about the Power Manager and then rebooted the system. Voila, the machine was able to connect, though the wireless LED indicator was still not lighting up. I then did a Windows Update, which updated the Atheros drivers, and the wireless indicator started working. I then did a Lenovo Update, which updated the wireless drivers (again) and the power manager. All now seems to be working great.

I guess there was some sort of corrupted driver issue. Funny how it seemed to happen all of a sudden, not as a result of a recent install of hardware/software/drivers.

[Marin85]

Glad that you got your issue resolved. BTW, this wifi power management thing is very common. If I have to admit I had my hard time until I found out about it...

Cheers,

Marin

[warder]

I had this very same error on an old z60m that I was setting up just now.

This is being posted to perhaps help someone save 3 hours of finding what was wrong as I just did.

I had installed a clean Vista SP1, but the symptoms were the same as this post: Wifi could browse and see, but not connect to anything.

I tried using AC5 to see if that helped, but it did the same as Vista... could see the router but not connect. It logged the same 65537 error posted here too.

Tried removing AES encryption as I've had this be a problem in the past. No help.

Tried power management. No joy. Tried older driver. No joy.

The solution turned out to be an obscure setting on the Wifi router: I use a DD-WRT router and had selected a '802.11g performance' option a while back. Turns out that the Atheros driver for the z60m doesn't like that even though 6 other wifi devices in the house do.

So... this same symptom can be caused by non-standard wifi options on the router too.