dead wireless card

[acid45]

Hello all,

I have a simple question, in my mind, and after googling I can't realy find much on it.

I have a wireless card that my brother killed on me. It was in my PC and I left and left him the card for the week while I was gone home. While he was installing it he failed to listen to me, and thi big yellow warning on the anti-static bag...INSTALL DRIVERS FIRST, I think this is a Microsoft Windows, maybe other OSs issue only. It doesn't seem to have the same effect with linux. Anyway, I had to get a new card. I kept the old one hoping that maybe the card wasn't fried but rather some software got wiped or something. I don't know much about wireless.

My question is, is there any way that I can repair the card. I went to google trying to figure out what exactly the warning for installing drivers first for windows is all about. I'm sure I'd find it in an A+ book...

The really funny thing is that my brother used to always brag that he knew so much about computer because he had his A+, and from what I hear, wireless is covered in A+ since the late '90s.

[Modorf]

the process is for the autodetect to work correctly and for the drivers to get a firm planting in the system.

though this isn't a windows forum. install the drivers from the cd and then try to re-install the card. it might work. otherwise device manager and delete the device (uninstall). remove all referances to the device, even try safe mode to remove the device entirely from device manager.

then reboot in normal mode and start the process over.
drivers, then insert card.

hope that helps.

[banzaikai]

It'd help if we knew which card this was. PCMCIA? CardBus? PCI? USB?

Some guesses:

PCMCIA runs on 5 volts, CardBus on 3.3 - CardBus won't work in a PCMCIA slot, and vice-versa.

Some cards are real flaky when it comes to WEP/WPA. Try disabling this on both router/WAP and the card to see if it connects. Make sure it's not being "filtered" out by IP or MAC addys.

IRQ or Address conflict?

Range? Faraday cage between you and WAP? Antenna screwed in and extended?

To save power, most notebook cards use the LEDs for double or triple duty. Do you have the proper light sequence? (On my D-Link DWL-530, the two lights will blink alternately when it's powered and drivers are loaded, but no connection - they'll switch to blinking in unison when a link is established. Why they don't just use a "power" and "link" is beyond me...)

I'm with Modorf on this one - there is no physical way to blow up any card by not loading the drivers first. It'll affect the registry, but that's cured by unloading/reloading the driver. I've done just that on many computers, and the hardware has always survived (unless it was bad to begin with).

banzai "Less-wire" kai

[acid45]

I'm sorry, I should have mentioned that.

It's an MSI wireless B PCI card, and since I almost always used it under linux with the mad wifi drivers it worked fine and installing the physical card before the driver, I folowed the windows instructions when nusing it with windows for the first few weeks I had it. There was a warning on the anti static bag and in the windows 98/me/2000/blah/xp setup guide. My brother is an idiot...

Also, as I mentioned above, there was a warning. I'm guessing that there is a fried radio chip on the card but this chip seems to be easily replaced with some solder and of course a chip, seems designed for replacment. Well, the chip I think is fried anyway, the radio chip.

It would just be nice, and a confidence boost, if I could get this card working again. I don't want to use the card under windows anything, that's just how the card died.

Now the card comes up with a "unknown network device" with the driver already installed under windows, as reported by my brother. I'm trying to get a print/dvd rom nfs server going that's going to be in the same location as the other computer with a wireless card.

Any way to save a buck is good and with these spare P2/P3/Athlon 450s hanging around making pretty dust collectors, I'd like to do something useful with them.

Doing a check on why wireless manufacturers tell you to install the driver first for windows OSs doesn't seem to be very clear. I don't believe it gives the driver a chance to seat itself into the OS or whatever. I think it has to be there so that windows won't go blindly doing what it shouldn't to the card. Like probing radio chips? My brother, same brother that killed the card, said he remebered something about radio equipment in his A+ course.

Trying to remember I don't think I ever tried using the mad wifi drivers on the card, I just bought a new one because I needed it quickly and it wasn't working under windows.

The lack of my ability to find info. on why this happens, which should be well documented since every wireless card I saw that was PCI had a warning not to install the card before installing the windows driver, has lead me to making assumptions that it is in fact a dead radio chip.

Nothing I try revives this card. I'm using an antena I know works, it's working right now. I know the AP is configured, it's working right now...

[banzaikai]

I'm still standing firm with Modorf: a driver will not destroy hardware, nor will installing hardware before software. It'll only mess things up OS-wise, but won't do any physical harm.

Since this is a PCI device, static seems to be a good culprit. Inserting with the power still on (I've met A+ grads who have done this) can also cook a card in no time flat. The fact that Windows doesn't work with the card, but is able to identify it as a networking device tells me the ROM got fried (if it's the MSI PC11B2 card, then it has no Flash RAM). If the card is trying to grab multiple I/O channels or IRQs (or none), then this is the safe bet. The ROM seems to be the small 8-pin SOIC to the bottom left of the main IC (it could also be integrated into the main IC, with the serial ROM storing the MAC ID). I doubt the "radio chip" is bad, since that lies under a shield, and is buffered from the system by the main controller. Also, check any voltage regulators or "pico" fuses to see if it's just power to one of the devices/components.

Looks like you may need to go card shopping.

banzai "better luck next time" kai