Wifi button doesn't work properly in Windows 10

[bent14]

Hey Emerald,

I'm not trying to sound rude, so apologies if I come across that way, but I feel that you did not read my first post. I am not interested in getting the laptop to work with Windows 8. It came with Windows 8 and I immediately downgraded it to Windows 7. I have drivers installed for all of my devices. The laptop works on Windows 7, but it seems that due to the different radio management api on Windows 10, the Wifi radio is always "Hardware off" and the HP wireless button will not turn it on. It would seem to be a driver issue to me as when I hit the wireless button, it toggles bluetooth and airplane mode, but does nothing for the wifi. The LED on the button seems to be aware of the problem as it is always orange instead of white. I have the latest button driver, it just doesn't seem to see my Wifi radio at all.

[bent14]

Here are some screenshots to better show what I am talking about.

Netsh shows the radio status is off. I can mess around and get software on sometimes, but I can't get Hardware on regardless of what I do. 

Here is my device manager to show that I don't have any missing drivers.

Again, I know this laptop is not officially supported for Windows 10 by HP, but if my 9-year-old Toshiba laptop can work fine with Windows 10 (granted it isn't very fast,) why can't my 3-year-old HP laptop?

[bent14]

I have a new theory as to why this is not working... Despite what the service manual says, I don't think the Centrino 6235 card is properly "white listed" in the bios of this laptop. The bluetooth ID shows up in the bios, but nothing about the WLAN, and the UEFI diagnostics show that no wireless module is installed. I can't find the original Ralink card to put back in to try, so I ordered a new one and will post whether or not it works when it arrives.

If this is the case, it will be unfortunate since the Centrino 6235 appears to be the only 2x2 wireless module listed in the service manual. 

[Mrstenter]

Hey @bent14,

Thanks for letting us know what is happening. I feel that listed in the manual shows that you might need to change the antenna to have the 2x2 Wlan working as it is a different antenna.

From the manual. Integrated wireless local area network (WLAN) options by way of wireless module Two WLAN antennas built into display assembly.

Not sure if this helps. But adding my 2 cents.

Thanks.

[bent14 · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the suggestion Mrstenter, but now that I had stopped looking, I happened upon the fix for my problem. It is an issue of the card being unsupported, Windows 7 simply isn't affected by this newer method of white listing and I never tried Windows 8 to find out. I don't know why the card is listed in the manual if it's not supported, but I happened to try the part number listed for it in the manual and it doesn't bring up an Intel card, some completely different card comes up. Maybe somebody goofed when writing the service manual?

Anywho, in this video is what I had to do to get it to work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzAKcmlaH1M

Apparently, this is like "hard-wiring" the hardware radio on whilst the laptop is on, but now that I have done it, the wireless button does turn it off in software. The card still doesn't show up in the UEFI diagnostics.

[Mrstenter]

Hey Bent14,

Thanks for sharing your experience and I have looked into this more. It seems that some came with a custom upgrade on this Notebook. So that is why it is in the listing for replacement.

Thanks.

[bent14]

Interesting, well luckily  it's working great with the weird fix mentioned above. Thanks a lot for your help!