tx1000 wireless card disappearing

[anton]

hello,

just curious if any of you folks have experienced a similar problem - i am trying to figure out possible solutions.

this has been cross-posted on hp forums, pardon for spam.

issue: wifi hardware disappearing

HP Pavilion tx1000z CTO NB
purchased march 5 2007
one year warranty
july 28 2008 i unplugged the working laptop from power, carried it to another room, plugged it back into outlet and realized that wifi light switch in front is glowing amber and that windows does not see wifi hardware in the device manager

up until the incident i ran vista home premium sp1, current with all updates; bios F.1E; 2.00 A NVIDIA GeForce Go 6150 Video Driver; Broadcom Wireless LAN Driver for Microsoft Windows Vista 7.00 E; HP Wireless Assistant 3.00 I; NVIDIA nForce Chipset/Network Drivers 5.53 A; Essential System Updates for Microsoft Windows Vista 2.00.

last windows update - 7/25; nothing in the event log.

the wifi card hardware part in hp catalog is 407159-001.

the laptop was in light use, mostly as email/music/multimedia/word processing for 3-4 hrs a day. it always was connected via wifi. the manual wifi trigger was almost never used.

when the problem happened, i did all the usual steps - reinstalled drivers, flashed bios, unpowered and removed battery for an extended period of time, etc. i have also removed the wifi card and plugged it back in to make sure there was no physical connectivity problem.

only once the wifi card and connectivity came back up - a few minutes after the incident i powered down, removed battery for 10 minutes, and then powered back. once i rebooted, it was invisible again.

called support, case 801-427-6116. spent 1 hr 40 minutes. i have not paid for the call, insisting that it was a common manufacturing defect, and asking to be escalated further. got escalated from frontline (shawn?) to tech support (?) to supervisor (michelle?). according to her, they have no known cases for tx1000, but they do have a known recall for dv6000. note however, that tx1000 is relatively new (i believe my model based on amd cpu became available a month before my purchase), so that if there is a problem that manifests itself 15 months after purchase, we would see the reports starting to trickle in right about now.

the supervisor could do nothing for me, except for usual $600+ for mobo sent to me or $300+ to send in for fixes. so i gave up.

i have considered ordering a replacement wifi card (part 407159-001); however, according to many reports on the forums (links below) it only solves the problem temporarily; only motherboard replacement seems to solve it completely.

meanwhile i have purchased a usb wifi card as a temporary solution.

now i consider this laptop a ticking timebomb - according to many other reports this wifi failure could be followed by a motherboard failure. i backup frequently, and i am on the market for a replacement laptop.

this was my first brush with hp after 10+ laptops over the years with other manufacturers (i buy for myself, family, friends, and recommend to others), and unless hp does something to change my opinion, it will be the last.

it is important to speak up and report this problem. besides knowledge sharing, we might stumble on a solution, and perhaps even convince HP that there is a systemic hardware problem. call in if you can - they track the number of calls related to a problem, and hopefully once it reaches a certain threshold, they will be forced to act.

please post links to other posts discussing this. with enough concrete data we should be able to build a case and hold hp responsible (note that for dvXXXX series laptops the warranty was extended and laptops were effectively recalled precisely for this kind of problem: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...087277&dlc=en).

thank you.

(some of these links might start out with other models, just search for 1000):

http://forums12.itrc.hp.com/service/...readId=1245147
http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/...readId=1188907
http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/...readId=1104931
http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/...readId=1190592
http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/...readId=1136440
http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/...readId=1210377
http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/...readId=1245319
http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/...readId=1280643

http://forums.cnet.com/5208-7587_102...geID=279261 8

http://forum.tabletpcreview.com/show...561#post122561
WiFi not loading up at ALL!!!
Wireless network switch
TX1220US: Wireless suddenly disconnects, neet to reboot

http://blog.nofreebits.com/2008/09/h...ssors-and.html
http://xiirus.net/articles/article-h...fix-t522o.aspx
http://indrajitc.wordpress.com/2008/...ected-anymore/
http://www.codoxide.com/post/TX1000-...-SUCKS%21.aspx

[DRTigerlilly]

This has been detailed somewhat here

[anton]

Originally Posted by Drtigerlilly

This has been detailed somewhat here

thank you for the reply. unfortunately flashing bios did not help, and at the time of the incident i was running the latest version of the bios (the version mentioned in the original post).

thank you for the wealth of links though, i will follow them to see if there is anything else out there.

[Doy22]

The post "tx1000 wireless card disappearing" is very informative.... Even I agree that it is important to speak up and report this problem...
_____________________
Millionaire Maverics

[DRTigerlilly]

as i have iterated on the announcement on the HP forum here on our site.
But the speaking up should be done to HP, do post here, so that we can create at least some record of users having issues.

At present it seems like the only remedy is replacing the motherboard, but HP has yet to make an official recall or warranty advisement as they have done with their other machines exhibiting these problems, so if you do experience any similar problems with your tx1000 or 2000 (not tx2500) please report it to HP.

[anton]

from wall street journal (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1219...googlenews_wsj):

The problem affects an undisclosed number of laptop computers, stopping them from booting up, causing display screens to go dark and other problems. Nvidia has traced it to packaging materials used on some chips that manage graphics and other functions, which can fail if they get too hot. The company disclosed the problem last month and is taking a $196 million reserve to cover computer makers' costs in addressing it.

Nvidia hasn't recalled the affected chips or identified which models have problems. Dell Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Co., the two customers that have so far announced plans for coping with the problem, said they won't repair affected laptops until they fail.

although it might not necessarily be the cause of my exact problem, but after reading up on many similar symptoms, this might be one of the causes.

[anton]

from http://www.channelregister.co.uk/200...efect_lawsuit/

A lawsuit alleging Nvidia violated US securities laws and kept secret a major defect in its graphics chip product line was filed in a Californian district court...

so things might be moving along - keep notifying HP of your problems, and we might get a recall.

[Farso]

Just been on the phone to them about a similar problem with the wireless card.

It seems that they want the whole laptop even though they know what the problem is...

They want TWO WEEKS to do a 2 min job

And then theres the hastle of removing all my work materials off the hard drive just so they can use it!

Alternative... Ebay and £14

[DRTigerlilly]

its not a two minute job, they're going to replace the motherboard, not just the wireless card. Yes two weeks is excessive, but short of you having an on site warranty (which i'm not even sure if HP offers) those are your options.

[Nihility]

Unfortunately, I too am plagued with the disappearing wireless card issue.
It started three days ago, it just disappeared. Did not show up in the device manager and the HP wireless assistant only showed a bluetooth device and no wireless. I figured it was some kind of weird BIOS issue so I took out the battery and flicked the on switch a few times and when I booted it up the wireless was back on and I breathed a sigh of relief. A day later it was gone again, nothing I did would restore it.

The laptop is around 8 months old and this is a very foreboding sign. Even if they replace the faulty hardware with the exact same components should I be expecting it to die again in 8 months?

edit: btw I have a tx1320us