Hello all,
New here. I have an ROG GL553VW. I'm not really even a gamer but I like fast powerful cool laptops. It's mostly worked well last 3 years but there's been some issues. First when I tried to use linux with it, problems with graphic card. No big deal. Then later my internal camera stopped working. I uninstalled and reinstalled the device manager (driver) for it and it was fixed, but then it happened again a few months later. I tried hard to fixed that, talked to support, worked with drivers. I think it uses a generic driver, Human Interface Device. I tried hard, but couldn't fix it, so I shelled out $20 for an external camera. Worked fine, problem solved.
Just yesterday I am having a problem with my wifi. Thankfully I can connect to ethernet here. Every month I get smarter with computers and this iteration maybe I'll be able to go deeper and solve this. It would feel great. Here's the story:
I was eligible for a new router from Xfinity. My old router was capped at a certain speed and they kept telling me to upgrade, but if it wasn't broke I didn't want to mess with it. Then yesterday my old router or network connection did have a hiccup. I got disconnected from zoom and the internet just at my lunch break, which was convenient. I tried numerous things but couldn't fix it but then a straight restart of windows 10 fixed it. Back in business. But that made me decide just to update the router. So yesterday afternoon I went to xfinity and got a new router. It looks a lot better, a compact white router vs a big ugly black box like router.
I followed their setup. It was an easy set up. It worked and was found on every other device- my linux laptop and my android and I think all my roommate's devices.
At first, I could see my SSID "House Wifi" and yes it showed full strength. I'm physically close to the router, within 15'. At first, one of two things kept happening on my Windows 10 machine and only my windows 10 machine:
I could see the SSID "House wifi" but it would either not connect. It would tell me right away it would not connect. Or else if I toggled on and off the wifi (or airplane mode) and turned it back on, it would say connected, secured, but when I went to a website, it would revert to the 'connecting' status and stay there.
I ran a windows diagnostic and was given the following error message "Wireless association failed because Windows did not receive any response from the wireless router"
That was very telling.
So in this time, of course I tried resetting my router, forgetting the network, all the basics, as well as uninstalling my Intel(r) Dual Band wireless AC 7265, restarting my computer. Nothing worked. That was the first half of the evening.
I did some other settings in network and sharing center of the control panel. I disabled everything but the ethernet, which thankfully works, and the wireless. I disabled and renabled the wireless. I played around with properties of ipv4 and ipv6 including dns. All this should be good. I disabled all the virtualization and vpn connections. I'm not sure if this has anything to do with what followed or is just coincidental but during the second half of the evening, and right now the following morning, I could not even see my SSID (network name), yet I can see other SSIDs. I can still see it on other devices, and connect to it. Again, only on this Windows (I have not tried other windows devices as I do not have any) I cannot see my SSID but I can connect to the router via ethernet. We also tried last night to factory reset the router. That didn't work. I can get into the config page at 10.0.0.1 and look around there but I coudln't find anything that worked or looked promising. I tried assigning my device a static ip number as opposed to DHCP, giving it it's subnet mask and all that. I kinda know a little about that, but not that much. That didn't work. I ended up reseting those settings to auto. I also noticed in the gateway config page (10.0.0.1) and my xfnity app that it did show my desktop as having been connected at one point a few hours prior (when I started the router) but that it was currently not connected). I never once got a page load or anything to indicate connection but Xfinity thought I was connected at some point.
Of course I ran the diagnostics tool numerous times. MS pats itself on the back and thinks it found the answer when it says "Such and Such random SSID is not set to automatic connect". As if. Man. I tried to connect to other open networks with weak signal but it didn't connect. I don't know if that's a function of general failure to connect or just the networks. I want to test this at a public wifi and see if it will connect to a public hotspot. Honestly if it will connect to others, and I can use ethernet at home, which I just started doing, and if my roommate's aren't having any problems, I'll just due that. Most coffeeshops are closed due to covid but I can figure it out. If it doesn't connect to any hotspot (though they show up, with varying signal strengths), then we have a deeper issue.
That's most all of what I tried last night.
What I tried this morning was rolling back a the latest windows update, which was yesterday. I did so and restarted, but it looks like it reinstalled as of today 1/30/2021, so I paused installs. I did the same, but it still looks like it reinstalled as it shows I can install the update of 1/30/21. I give up. Do I really give up?
I tried that. Didn't work. Oh yeah yesterday I tried reseting winsock in the terminal and the network inside the windows settings, restarted my computer, and it didn't fix anything. The network didn't show up under ipconfig or whatever the command is either.
Today I also started talking to a windows support staff. He suggested downloading the network drivers from Asus.
I did that, I downloaded them. He said to restart computer (before installing). I did. The old drivers came back. BTW I don't have option to rollback any drivers. That option is grayed out on my machine. I haven't been able to reconnect to him on chat. Actually after chatting with him, and restarting, my computer was stuck in 'getting ready', for half an hour. It said do not restart. I read online about this and people said their machines have been stuck in that state for hours and days, so I just powered down, disconnected cables and restarted (my current session). I'm glad I didn't break anything. I installed all the updates to current state (one was a .NET framework thing that I happen to have. I think it's a visual studio SDK or something, that I probably won't use). I haven't been able to get him or anyone back on the chat, though we have our message log. I have a support number.
Alright so I haven't installed the drivers I downloaded from Asus. I'm willing to but there's one caveat about the Networking driver. I extracted it and was reading the instructions and FAQs. So far so good. I clicked on the installer, and it talked about Ethernet. Ethernet is right now my only connection to the world wide web and I don't want to break it. If I break ethernet I am done, potentially. Besides ethernet is not my issue, wifi is. So maybe that's just semantics and if I did the instructions or ran the installer, all would be well and wifi would be fixed. Or maybe all would be well with ethernet but wifi would not be fixed. Or maybe it would be broken but I could fix it without an internet connection, which is fine. Or maybe it would be broken and I coudln't fix it wihtout an internet connection, which is the scenario I'm most worried about, so I haven't installed it yet (the Networking driver Version V10.8.311.2016
2016/08/16 Realtek LAN Driver from asus.com). I actually see just below it, if I click more, that there's a driver dated one day prior, that is RealTek Wireless Lan Driver and Application. I'll try that after this forum post. If I report back success, then it's good, otherwise assume failure. Maybe that's the one I need
Also I noticed my bios version is 202 and the latest is 306. I downloaded the latest bios from Asus but haven't installed it. I'm happy and willing to if I can be reasonably confident nothing will break or my computer will not be bricked. I'm a little nervous about this but that's mostly because I haven't researched it at all. We'll see what that does. Perhaps that will fix both my old webcam issue and my wireless. Who knows. BTW I forgot to report, I was in BIOS earlier (or UEFI) and turned off both virtualization settings, just to check on that. Nothing else looks funky in BIOS.
So where I stand, I will see about the Realtek Wireless Lan Driver and Application and about BIOS but any pointers you can give me there would be great, or any knowledge you might have would be great. The MS support agent told me to run some command prompt commands but they didn't find or fix anything:
Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth
Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth
Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
Also run the System File Checker utility:
Open Start, type: CMD
Right click CMD
Click Run as administrator
At the Command Prompt, type: sfc/scannow
Any knowledge or insight you have would be great. It's frustrating but also a great learning opportunity. I'd be psyched if I fixed this. I'm learning to code and data structures and algorithms but I'd rather not foucs on the windows 10 but if I can get a win here that would be huge. I've probably invested 6+ hours at this point. I like Windows mostly but the updates and bugs are what drive me crazy. I wanna stick with windows if they can handle these types of issues. I felt like I could handle them by being smarter, understanding drivers, regedit, advanced settings would allow me to overcome any conflicts that may arise, but apparently not. Perhaps there are some issues that even someone with perfect knowledge cannot fix in windows just because of the nature of the problem and his access. Who knows. But to understand better what's going on would be great.
It seems like a Router-Device communication thing. Remember that diagnostic earlier?
"Wireless association failed because Windows did not receive any response from the wireless router". That could be the big hint (and I googled and tried stuff), but that was when the "House wifi" still showed up in the GUI. BTW when i tried to manually add a network with the same name, it said one already existed. I can't remember where I accessed that method.
I could try playing around with all the driver settings like Channel Width, HT mode, and ~18 others, whatever those things are.
In settings, my network properties for the intel wifi it shows under my MAC address the status: Not operational. It shows connectivity: disconnected which makes sense, but it also shows the same for my bluetooth, and testing out my headphones, that worked fine and still showed Not Operational. Only ethernet of all connections show operational (and connected to the internet).
Both ethernet and wifi show same default gateway (10.0.0.1) but ethernet shows also an (assumed) ipv6 default gateway
I've never done a Windows reset. I don't want to lose data and all my apps. I could look into that but I don't want a bigger headache than necessary.
I can't think of anything else to ask or mention. I'll look in the asus wifi and bios installations, manual and automatic and I'll proceed with caution. I've never gone this deep.
I hope someone here can share any insights. BTW does Asus/ROG/this version of laptop tend to not play nice with Windows? It's been mostly good and I haven't made any big changes recently. Hopefully there's an answer somewhere. There has to be some reason somewhere. If possible, can one install a new physical card? That could be something I could look into but I don't want a bigger headache from side effects. Its' not about the money but I don't want more things to have to deal with if I go that route, assuming that is a valid route. Have I given this enough effort or am I being lazy?
Thanks in advance!