Intel PRO Wireless 3945ABG stopped working, suspecting permanent hardware damage.
I have a dell inspiron 1520 with intel 3945abg wireless. I installed Win7 RC 7100 a week back(formatting the original vista home premium 32). The wifi stopped working completely on yesterday, after waking up from a long sleep. Flicking the on-off switch, restarting, updating, formatting, reformatting - I've tried everything, it still won't work. There is an error code 10 in device manager network adapter entry(saying something like device can't be started, and the yellow exclamation mark). Panicked, I switched back to vista, the problem still remains. My laptop warranty expired on May 2009.
July 20th, 2009 9:31pm

If it turns out your wirless is a hardware issue:Bad News: Wireless is onboard and you'll need to replace the entire motherboard to replace the wireless.Good News: You could provide a work-around by purchasing a wireless NIC card. It would stick out the side of your laptop a bit, but certainly cheaper than purchasing and paying for installation of replacement board.edit: sometimes the laptop has a button/switch/touch sensative spot that turns off wireless on the BIOS level. If you have such a switch/button/touch spot on your laptop, makesure it isn't turned off.
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July 20th, 2009 11:28pm

not necessarily. most dell inspirons have the mini wireless card which you can access by opening the appropriate plate on the bottom of the laptop and yanking the card out to replace it.
July 21st, 2009 8:23pm

not necessarily. most dell inspirons have the mini wireless card which you can access by opening the appropriate plate on the bottom of the laptop and yanking the card out to replace it. Hi mate... i have the same issue and its a annoying. did you fix it after? Let us know... Thanks.. PS:Yep the WLAN card is underneath and can be replaced. I think its got something to do with Administrator tools???
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September 11th, 2010 7:50pm

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