[Aiwendil42]

My desktop recently started having a problem with its wireless network adapter. Occasionally when I turned it on, it would be unable to detect or connect to my (or any) network, and when I looked in device manager under network adapters, I would see only "Microsoft 6to4 adapter", with a warning that it was not working properly because the drivers could not be loaded (code 31). When everything was working, I would see both the 6to4 adapter and the "802.11b/g/n PCI express Wireless Network Adapter" listed in device manager.

Initally, I was able to solve the problem simply by clicking on "Network adapters" and choosing "scan for hardware changes". The Wireless Network Adapter would reappear in the list and I'd be able to connect to my network. However, this morning I tried this and it did not work - after scanning for new hardware, the Wireless Network Adapter was still missing. I did a system restore and that solved the problem.

This afternoon, I booted up my computer and again the adapter was missing. Scanning for hardware changes failed to help. I went to do a system restore, but was shocked when I was told that no restore points existed. I never disabled system restore, and just this morning there were ten or so restore points. I decided to try installing the adapter by doing "Add Legacy Hardware". I did not see a PCI express wireless adapter in the list to manually choose from, but there was one called "802.11b/g/n PCI Wireless Network Adapter" and one just "802.11b/g/n Wireless Network Adapter". I tried installing both of these and after doing so, they appear in the device manager list, but both are "not working properly because Windows cannot load the drivers required (code 31)". I also decided to try un-installing and re-installing the "Microsoft 6to4 adapter" (not sure what that is). I uninstalled it and, as expected, it disappeared from the device manager list, but after re-installing it, although I get no errors during the re-installation process, it does not re-appear in device manager.

Any help with this would be very much appreciated. Thanks!

Edit: I forgot to mention, I'm running Windows Vista.

Edited by Aiwendil42, 18 April 2011 - 12:25 PM.

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A correction and an update. The wireless card that appears under network adapters when running correctly is "802.11n Wireless PCI Express Card LAN Adapter" which I think is from Ralink. I downloaded the driver and re-installed it, but it didn't help.

Again, any help would be highly appreciated.

Edited by Aiwendil42, 18 April 2011 - 01:44 PM.

[Aiwendil42]

A correction and an update. The wireless card that appears under network adapters when running correctly is "802.11n Wireless PCI Express Card LAN Adapter" which I think is from Ralink. I downloaded the driver and re-installed it, but it didn't help.

Again, any help would be highly appreciated.

Edited by Aiwendil42, 18 April 2011 - 01:44 PM.

[Aiwendil42]

An update: I can make the wireless adapter show up in device manager only after repeated scans for hardware changes, but if I restart it's gone again. When it does appear, its status is 'code 12', i.e. 'this device cannot find enough free resources that it can use.' If I view devices by connection, I see three 'ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Ports' listed, with the ethernet card on one and the wireless card on another. The port that the ethernet card is on lists, under the 'resources' tab in properties, two memory ranges, an I/0 range, and an IRQ. The port that the wireless card is on lists just an IRQ - no memory ranges or I/0 range. I suppose this is the problem?

Again, if anyone can help, I'd appreciate it.