HP Pavilion 15 - Weak wifi signal from Broadcom card but USB wifi adaptor OK

[mikelwest]

Hi

I have a new HP Pavilion 15-po78sa Notebook, Product number: J5B65EA#ABU, running Windows 8.1 64-bit

The Wifi card is a Broadcom BCM43142 802.11 bgn.

I'm getting only 1 bar signal strength but all other devices in the house (laptop, ipad, nexus) have a full strength signal.

I tried a Samsung USB wifi adaptor & I'm getting full signal strength with this.

I updated the drivers for the Broadcom card but there's no difference.

[Filippo_Vischi]

Hi,

I am having exactly the same problem.

I recently bought a laptop HP Pavilion 15, product number J1Z18EA#ABZ, running Windows 8.1 64 bit with a Broadcom BCM43142 802.11 bgn WiFi adapter.

My modem is barely 3 feet away and the signal strength is 1 bar. My mobile phone (Nexus 5), the iPad and my other laptop (an old HP running Windows 7) are showing full strength (or at least 4 out of 5 bars).

All the drivers are up to date and nothing changed. How can we fix this?

regards

filippo

[MechPilot]

Hello @mikelwest and @Filippo_Vischi,

I have read your posts on how your notebook computers have 1 bar of signal in comparison to your other wireless devices, and I would be happy to assist you in this matter!

Based on the information contained in your posts, I recommend contacting our technical support at 800-474-6836. If you live outside the US/Canada Region, please click the link below to get the support number for your region.

http://www8.hp.com/us/en/contact-hp/ww-phone-assist.html

I hope this helps!

Regards 🙂

[Filippo_Vischi]

Hi,

no, your solution does not help. I find it outrageous that on a brand new laptop worth about 700 euros I have to complain about the WiFi adaptor chosen by HP for this model. This will be a good thing to think about when I ll be chosing my next laptop, that surely wont be an HP machine anymore.

@mikelwest: i am not sure whether this will be useful or not for you, but I just bought a D-Link nano wireless adapter (DWA131 N300) for a few bucks and everything works perfectly now. Signal strength is 5 out of 5 bars and the speed is good as well. Of course, on the other hand, one of the USB ports will always be occupied....

good luck with your issue.

all the best,

filippo

[Nubiwan]

This worked for me so far tonight.  I have an HP 15 with a broadcom modem.   I can get signal downstairs, but in my bedroom, signal kept dropping.  This worked for me.

Seen a few of these posts weak wifi signal and not many resolutions.  Try this.  I called an old wise Tech from my old job.  He told me it usually means the power needs boosting on wifi.  To change laptop power settings from HP recommended to High performance.  I did it and, so far, it has worked for me.  Try it.  Might chew up battery cycles, but better than the alternative.  I have mine plugged in anyway.

[Subha81]

I have had same problem. The RaLink adaper from HP does not marry well with Windows 8.1 it seems.

Here are the steps I followed to solve my problem

1) Uninstalled Ralink wi-fi driver software from Control panel

2) Reboot (now wifi is totally gone)

3) Went to device manager, went to network adapter and unintsalled RaLink wifi Adapter as well

4) Connected to LAN and restarted

5) After restart, the adapter automatically installs and wifi-works again

My wifi network strength is back to 4 bars from previously 1 bar. Other laptop shows 5 bar. But so far 1 less bar did not cause any perceivable decrease in speed.

Do a factory reset after taking backup, as last option if above does not work.

If factory reset is not helpful, take the laptop to a service center or buy a usb nano wifi adapter (I was using a 500 INR or 8 $ adapter till I got the above solution working). 

[mlhifi]

Although this post is relatively old, it's worth adding to it for future post searches!

I too have a Pavilion 15 with a Broadcom wireless card.  (And I thought the Atheros ones were bad!!)

Anyway, I had the same problem when I first bought it; only one signal detected and that was my own, and it was weak  despite sitting next to the router!  As a consequence, wi-fi speed was so slow as to be unuseable.

So, I connected the laptop via LAN cable and downloaded the Broadcom driver from the HP website.

Once installed, it worked just fine.

Just to add, this was not a one-off cure and/or a coincidence!

I have, in the last year, re-installed windows a few times and the above procedure is required each time.

Hope this is of some help.

EDIT:  Oddly enough, a wi-fi card driver just downloaded to my Pavilion and, guess what?, yes, I'm back to one detected signal:  MINE!

Rolled back the driver and all is right with the (wifi) world again!

EDIT -  29TH JUNE 2016

I have just had a problem; yes, same again, one bar signal strength and all I can "see" is my own network.

I went back to the HP website and downloaded the "latest" Broadcom driver, dated 27-7-2015.

Downloaded that, ran it and "Voila" back to full signal.

It turns out, this is the same version driver that I rolled back to in the reference above!  So, proves one thing to me... this is THE driver to use, no other will do! v7.35.275.2

[Milcom]

I Have same Problem bro... I have resolved by update the Broadcom card into "Broadcom BCM43142 802.11 M.2 Adapter" and my wifi signal is become full 5 bars.... but this solution is just for HP Pavilion with Broadcom Wifi Card...

[Atin90]

Hi,

I do not own HP but did purchase Dell XPS 13 notebook and have the same isues. I found the solution:

A) replace the Broadcom WIFI with Intel WIFI or

B) reduce the Power Output of the Broadcom WIFI card to 75% (found in advanced properties of the card)

[El_Greeko]

Hello everybody, 

I was playing around with the wifi cards and tried out to unplug the antenna on the wifi card on an old laptop of mine. 

Well, I had no wifi signal in a range over 5 meters. 

A friend of mine said he had this problem too, hp (I gues the laptop is too the pavillio 15). I told him to look after the antenna at the wifi card. 

And there he saw something strange. THe wifi chip card had 2 letterings, one onboard (on the chip card) and one on the a sticker. On the onboard the wifi antenna was plugged in to the channel 2 (L2) and on the sticker it was the channel 1. 


Well, he changed the channel, plugged the antenna on the L1 (channel 1 Onboard) and voila, it worked for him very well. No driver updates, no different drivers, nothing. Just the wifi antenna. (Also he had only a wifi antenna, no AUX antenna like some other notebooks)

Hope it helps for you too in that way (if the drivers are not the problem).