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Hrant

Hrant

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Joined
25 October 2001
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Location
Northern California
Daughter's laptop is connecting poorly via wireless network - but OK with wired conncetion. We think it is the wifi card as all other diagnostics seem ok ..... at least based on my tests using laptop's diagnostics. I am thinking getting a USB-wifi to solve the problem instead of pouring some $150-$200 for 4th year college computer is the way to go. One local shop said it is probably the wifi module ....

But .... in the wireless network properties/advanced settings there is a tab that says:

802.11 Settings
Enable Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) compliance network

I have never seen this before. Kind of open house permission for NSA to browse??!!
 
It's just an encryption methodology. You would only enable it if it's enavled/supported at the router. Basically it's a govt requirement so if you want the govt to buy your laptop you need to support it. I think it's just AES and disables TKIP
 
no, has nothing to do with signal strength. there are a million settings on your NIC and router that simply aren't relevant to the consumer in most cases. if you have poor strength on one device and all others are working fine, typically it's not the config of anything, you just have a problem with your device most likely. I'd just pick up a $30 USB wireless dongle as you were thinking of doing.
 
Those usb wifi adapters are generally garbage. The drivers are horrible and unstable. I guess it
might be better than no wifi at all though.
 
Depends on what you buy I suppose. I use them all the time in desktops without issue as long as there is decent wifi coverage. The drivers for many of those are no different than the drivers for an integrated wifi chipset.
 
Just put a computer together for the first time in about ten years, and have a netgear usb wireless adapter on it. Seems to work fine, but looking at a pcie just to see if there's a difference.
 
From what I "heard" at best buy and an independent shop, avoid D-Link USB-wifi as that is the lower end - Linksys makes D-Link. Netgear and Belkin were the other two brands.
 
So, how do other devices perform on you wireless network. Is this the only slow computer?
 
warrenw said:
So, how do other devices perform on you wireless network. Is this the only slow computer?
Click to expand...


Yes only this one shows the problem. Using it 4 feet away from the Comcast router and when it first recognizes wireless connection, signal is almost all bars green and then it goes to 1 or 2 bars at best. It had poor reception at Best Buy when they tried to give a visual diagnostics.
 
If all devices in your home were having an issue, then it could be a very congested wireless channel and you could configure your wireless router to use a cleaner wifi channel

This sounds more like a flaky wireless NIC though.. disable the on-board Wireless in the laptop's BIOS (if possible) or in the Operating System, then try a USB to WIFI dongle like others have mentioned

Make sure you aren't using a microwave near these devices as microwaves flood the entire radio frequency range with noise and can drop connections or make them flaky
Of course, this only occurs when the microwave is heating up your pizza from last night

A real simple test is to connect to your wireless router from a smartphone and load a wifi finder/utility application (handy app that tells you all sorts of stuff about your wifi connection)
that will give you a baseline of the signal strength, SNR, etc that you SHOULD be seeing in the laptop at the same location

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_WLAN_channels

FIPS is a US Federal standard for encryption modules used in network communications. If you don't use the computer on a US Government network, you usually don't care about FIPS standards
 
Last edited:
As a trouble shooting step: Using a smartphone, tether the PC to the phone via a personal hotspot to your wireless network.
If still slow, then it isn't the hardware, but the OS or settings on the PC.
 
warrenw said:
As a trouble shooting step: Using a smartphone, tether the PC to the phone via a personal hotspot to your wireless network.
If still slow, then it isn't the hardware, but the OS or settings on the PC.
Click to expand...

We did that at Best Buy! The Geek guy used his cell phone and the conncection was low; he noted their (Best Buy) network was also slow.

I don't know what other setting can be tested or changed is on the laptop. I have gone through all the layman's tests ....
 
Hrant ..you need more power.....use bigger batteries.....or 2 plugs:tongue:
 
when you said wired connection is " just " good how much ram does it have? how much space is left on the Harddrive. college girls have tons of pics ya know

maybe to many apps running in the background.

is this a PC or a MAC?

if PC then goto start type " msconfig " in the empty space if win7 which I assume. then go to the left tab called startup then click hide microsoft items. then look thru it and see how much crap is in there. could be mcafee junk, multiple printers installed thru the years, blahh blahh blahh uncheck the items she doesnt use or you know that are junk if not sure about any of them
google them. restart machine if prompted.

backup your registry before this one. LOL

then log back in. same thing goto start, but instead type regedit and hit enter.
then scroll to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
then software
then microsoft
then windows
then current version
then highlight run.

look to the left of the screen and right click and delete everything except your current antivirus if its listed.
this should speed your machine up a ton depending on what was in there to begine with.

then check for updates on your machine via microsofts update windows app.

- - - Updated - - -

then test wifi again. and report back
 
Good questions - and you hits some on the nail .......... and I have been preaching some of this .....

Intel i5, 2.4GHz, 4GB Ram, Windows 7; 500 GB hard drive is down to 35 GB of free space - yes I know, this after I bought her 8 months ago a passport drive for her music files ....... and I am sure there are zillion of unused programs but frankly some of those names are deliberately convoluted/vague to make a laymen unable to figure what they do so they end up staying. But I can see a few music programs (zune, itunes, pandora ......)

The curious thing is once it recognized the wifi without a USB key, it appears to be full strength. The moemnt you connect to the Internet is drops to 1-2 bars 4ft away from the router. Once I leave the room it pretty much loses. With the USB-Wifi, I get 2 bar at the other corner of the house, separated by a few walls/rooms - just like the other laptops in the house. So the USB-wifi is working as it is supposed to.
 
well then, here are some more tips, you can log into your router and change the Freq. to lets say channel a-b-c and see if that works with your device.

also in different points of the house some walls may have more in them, IE pipes, wires etc. that could be the drop in signal.

also if your standing 4 ft from the rounter what we call " line of sight " means you can see the antenna and its not behind a door or object and your still getting low signal.

then you may have security issues with auth. try loging into your router and change your WIFI to non-secure. but...... do not broadcast your SSID. and try that. your signal strength should rise to full bars anywhere in the house.

your wifi is open.... YES..... but since no-one else knows your SSID also known as your wifi networks name they cant see it, hack it or login to it. its invisible.

so I always have open network but never broadcast your networks name. and its the best NON-hackable thing you can do.

report back.
 
alright Hrant here is a little known trick...all at once hit ctrl/alt/delete...........thats all i got.:biggrin:
 
I'm late to respond but it might be worth popping to cover off the case where the wifi adapter is and making sure the antenna wire connects to the board is sound.
I know the USB adapter solved the problem, so the suggestion is probably moot.
 
Miner said:
I'm late to respond but it might be worth popping to cover off the case where the wifi adapter is and making sure the antenna wire connects to the board is sound.
I know the USB adapter solved the problem, so the suggestion is probably moot.
Click to expand...


Good suggestion. How will I know where the antenna wire is? Is there a generic schematics?
 
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