On the windows 10 taskbar, the Network connection icon has 3 options, or "buttons": Wifi, Aeroplane Mode and Mobile hotspot.
However, on my windows 10 laptop, today somehow the options for WiFi and mobile hotspot are not appearing: only the option for Airplane mode appears. As a result, I am not able to find the list of available networks and connect to the internet.
Further, upon opening the "network and internet " option in system settings, I observed something: Normally, windows 10 has 8 options to choose from:
Status,Wifi,Ethernet, Dial-up,VPN,airplane mode, Hotspot and proxy: However, in my case, only 6 options are present. The options for Wifi and Ethernet are NOT there.
Further things I have tried , on advice of a friend who knows how to deal with this stuff:
- Typed ipconfig on the cmd prompt, it gave me "Media state.....:media disconnected'. This apparently means the wifi is disabled.
- Went to control panel->network and internet->change adapter settings. Now, I have seen videos online of similar problems , and in most videos I see that here one finds their wifi network with the "disabled" status, and we simply right click and change it to enable. However, in my case, the wifi network is not appearing. It just shows one option: bluetooth network connection.
- Went to device manager-->network adapters. My wifi adapter still wasnt listed. It just showed a bluetooth PAN and a bunch of WANs.
Then, clicked on view hidden networks, and then, finally I found my adapter. The device status read " Currently, the device is not connected to the computer. To fix this problem, reconnect the hardware device on the computer."
My friend thinks that this pinpoints the problem: the laptop thinks that the wifi card has been removed.
I tried to update the drivers. Still, nothing changed. As a last straw, my friend suggested uninstalling the device and then hopefully upon rebooting, the adapter would be detected and automatically reinstalled.
However, upon rebooting now my adapter doesn't get listed even in the hidden networks list.
Now my friend thinks the only option is to change the wifi card somehow.
Is his analysis correct? Is there really no option other than going after the hardware?
This problem first started today, when due to a power outage the router turned off and naturally the laptop got disconnected from the internet. However, as the router was back on, all my other devices are connected properly to the Wifi, but this strange problem has appeared on my laptop.
Laptop: lenovo ideapad s-145. Wifi card: Realtek 8822CE.