How do you know what Wi Fi adapter you have?

[St3ve1]

Hey,

 I was looking at Wi-Fi drivers for this specific unit but for many other laptops,  i can find drivers for the network for a series of Wi-Fi adapters, like Intel, Realtek and Qualcomm.

 Now many times, a way to fix the internet dropping issue is by installing the latest Intel Wi Fi and Bluetooth adapter, but hence there are other drivers for adapters made by other manufacturers how do i know for sure that my unit has an intel Wi Fi adapter?

 I do know that in some cases you can check the back and see exactly what Wi-Fi adapter you have but are these region dependent ?

 Say for example. every  laptop, Pavillion, Envy and Stream that is sold in the UK, do all have an Intel Wi-Fi adapter? and what if its a laptop with an AMD processor and chipset ?

Really looking forward to hear from you guys.

Thank you,

Steven

[Huffer]

Find the hardware ID of the wireless adapter in device manager and either google what you come up with or post it here and we will tell you exactly what you have:

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/how-to-find-unknown-device-drivers-by-their-vendor-device-id/

From the specs of your model you have the 802.11b/g/n 1x1 which means you have the budget wireless likely to be Realtek or Ralink which are not good hardware and drivers are not likely to help. You also likely only have 1 antenna lead which means your upgrade options are very limited. Post back with any questions.

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Hi, Steven:

There is no information online regarding what model wireless network adapter your notebook has.

Since you are only looking for a driver update, you can easily find out that information by going to the device manager, click to expand the Network Adapters device manager category, and there you will find the name and model number of the wireless network adapter.

[St3ve1]

Hi,

 Thank you for your reply. If i am to go into Device manager, especially if i just set up the product, Windows will try to add generic drivers from its own source not necessarily the HP servers, is that correct ?

 Also, how does WIndows know what drivers do i need for this unit ?

 And still, why are there more drivers  for more than one model, listed for a specific unit ?

I don't mean to be a pain in the arse with this,  but you get a bit doubtful when you see a series of drivers for network, and are not really sure whats the difference and which one you actually need.

Thanks again,

Steven

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome.

That is correct.

If you upgraded to W10, W10 will either migrate the existing driver to W10 or install a generic W10 driver for the hardware.

There are more drivers listed because HP puts out all of the drivers for the entire model series on the support page.

That is why you may see multiple graphics drivers and network drivers.

If you let me know what model wlan card your notebook has (presumably you now know the model #), I will post the link to the latest W10 driver that HP has for the model card.

I may be able to find one even newer than what is on your notebook's support page by using drivers from HP business notebooks with the same wireless card.

They tend to keep the drivers updated more often for the business products.

[Huffer]

I'm gathering this is the problem. He does not know what type of wireless card he has. And no, just going into the device manager to ascertain which card you have will not affect the installed drivers. And I will add again that some of the wireless cards installed by HP are just not good hardware particularly if there is only one wireless antenna and there is no driver that will make the card functional to any reasonable degree so my advice is let's find out what you have before spending a lot of time on drivers. Just sayin'

[St3ve1]

Hey guys,

 I apologize for creating so much confusion. I'm not necessarily interested in what wireless card i have, i am rather interested in wether the Wi-Fi adapters are region or country specific and if i can expect that all the Envy or Pavilion units can use an intel wireless driver.

 I'm not looking for a specific driver version, but noticed that for many models, there are drivers for a series of adapters and in my case i was able to install both the Realtek wireless and the Intel wireless adapter.

 I guess the two ways to find that out is either looking up in Device manager and letting windows decide or checking the label on the laptop, is that correct ?

Thanks again

[Huffer · Accepted solution]

I suspect you installed the Realtek wired ethernet driver and the Intel wifi driver. Only the driver for the hardware you have will install. Actually, the label on the laptop won't tell you much. If you look up the support page for your specific model, it will show drivers for all optional devices available in that model series. And yes, wireless cards can be region specific. The radio communication regulations vary across the globe. Hence multiple wireless drivers are listed, some of which you cannot use. Unless you are having problems just use the driver that Windows supplies. If there is a problem it might be necessary to know your specific hardware so you can find a more specific driver as from the manufacturer website or you can search the internet for other people having a problem with that specific device and use drivers others suggest. I hope that makes some sense. 

[St3ve1]

Thanks,  that pretty much answers my question.

I'll stick with the windows drivers then, and if issue occurs, switch between installing other drivers from the HP site.