Wireless problem

[Russ50]

The wireless download speed on my HP Pavilion Dv6 (it is about 9 years old) has recently dropped from 50 Mbps to 3 Mbps (upload is basically unchanged at 15-18 Mbps). My first instinct was to blame the modem and the internet service provider but my Asus netbook and Samsung mobile are still working well on the same system. I have used HP “Assistant” to check Network Adapters in Device Manager and everything seems to be “Normal” (nothing flagged). Checked for updated drivers nothing required, temporarily removed my Kaspersky security but no change (I thought that perhaps there had been an upgrade that I was not aware of). I am not sure what else that I should check and I can only conclude that there is an undiagnosed problem with the wireless card (Intel Centrino wireless-N1030, 11230BNHMW). Any suggestions? Thank you.

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Hi:

Since you didn't reference what Intel wifi driver version you installed, the only suggestion I can offer would be to try this driver if it is newer than what you have installed now.

15.9

https://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp65001-65500/sp65170.exe

[Russ50]

Thanks for for your prompt reply Paul. My current driver is Intel 29/11/11,  15.0.0.75 so I will try your suggested upgrade. I may take a while to do it as I am not very computer literate. I am still somewhat confused by the fact that the system was working well with the present settings up until Christmas and the HP diagnostics are not pointing to any problems. How reliable are the diagnostics? I have been working with the help of the "Support Assistant" program.

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

You're very welcome.

Unfortunately, I wouldn't know why things were fine one minute and not the next.

However, the driver I gave you is quite a bit newer than the one you have now, and sometimes updating the driver to a newer version is all you need to do.

Anytime I have run the HP diagnostics tool in the HP support assistant, it tells me that everything is fine.

I usually don't have any issues, so I can't vouch for the reliability of the program.

Do you run the periodic tune up program in the HPSA?

I do that from time to time as well.

[Russ50]

Hi Paul,

Thank you for your help and advice. The wireless card is now working properly again but I am still a little confused by it all. I followed your advice as closely as I could. I downloaded the newer driver (from the link that you gave me), which installed on my C drive in a folder SWSetup. From there I clicked on the .exe program for the SP65170 driver. I was not entirely sure if it worked but it gave me a message “All installation complete” which was reassuring. I then went into Device Manager and clicked on Update. I then checked to see if the driver had been updated from the older version (15.0.0.75) but I kept getting a message saying that “the best driver was already installed”. I went through that process several times but no apparent change. I turned the computer off and restarted the system but still no apparent change in the installed driver, however, a check of the internet speed showed a return to normal which was great. I am still not sure what the glitch was but the wireless card has been going well for 36 hours now so I guess that time will tell. Thanks again Russ50

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Anytime.

Glad to have been of assistance.

I guess you have the latest driver installed.

In the intel wifi driver programs they include older drivers for older cards, and the uinstaller installs the latest driver for a particular model wifi card.  I guess yours maxes out at 15.0.0.75, and not 15.9, which must be for newer model Intel wifi adapters that driver supports.

Intel has removed support for all wifi adapters older than the 7260. 

I used to get the latest drivers from there for the specific model wifi cards.

So, now I kind of have to navigate blindly by checking newer HP notebooks with Intel wifi cards that have drivers that support a range of wifi cards.

I'm glad that whatever you did or whatever happened, resolved the problem.