identifying Wifi card in laptop

Hello,
I had purchased a new laptop. I have not been able to connect to
wifi networks. I am beginning to suspect that the laptop may not have
a wifi network card. How can I verify this?.

I have windows vista. I went to Device manager in control panel. Under
network adapters there is only one entry for my lan card. There is no
entry for any wireless lan device.

May be the driver is not installed. Can you tell me how to check
1) If the device is there.

I am beginning to suspect may be there is no wireless card at all.
Thanks

On Wed, 13 Aug 2008 15:55:11 -0700 (PDT), "persres@googlemail.com"
<persres@googlemail.com> wrote:

> I had purchased a new laptop. I have not been able to connect to
>wifi networks. I am beginning to suspect that the laptop may not have
>a wifi network card. How can I verify this?.

You normally have to turn it ON for it to work. There should be a
switch.

Check your user's manual, fer cryin' out loud.

well, if it is not listed under network adapters, check if you have a
cathegory named other devices, if it is it should show as ethernet
controller.

now, laptops normally have a FN key combination to turn on or off the
wireless card, if it is off, it will not show under the device manager.

you didnt specify which laptop, but normally it is FN + F2.


--
motarola2

well, well. I certainly have turned it on. Thanks a lot. But my
question is :
How do find out what device I have or if I have one at all?.
Either through the registry or through control panel.
Thanks

On Aug 14, 12:00*am, Paul Montgomery <nonnymo...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 13 Aug 2008 15:55:11 -0700 (PDT), "pers...@googlemail.com"
>
> <pers...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> > * * I had purchased a new laptop. I have not been able to connect to
> >wifi networks. I am beginning to suspect that the laptop may not have
> >a wifi network card. How can I verify this?.
>
> You normally have to turn it ON for it to work. *There should be a
> switch.
>
> Check your user's manual, fer cryin' out loud.

On Wed, 13 Aug 2008 16:29:12 -0700 (PDT), "persres@googlemail.com"
<persres@googlemail.com> wrote:

>well, well. I certainly have turned it on. Thanks a lot.

Not the computer, THE WIFI card <shaking head in disbelief>.

DID YOU CHECK YOUR MANUAL to see where the switch is??????

If it's not ON, it won't SHOW anywhere.


>But myquestion is :
>How do find out what device I have or if I have one at all?.
>Either through the registry or through control panel.
>Thanks
>
>On Aug 14, 12:00*am, Paul Montgomery <nonnymo...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> On Wed, 13 Aug 2008 15:55:11 -0700 (PDT), "pers...@googlemail.com"
>>
>> <pers...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>> > * * I had purchased a new laptop. I have not been able to connect to
>> >wifi networks. I am beginning to suspect that the laptop may not have
>> >a wifi network card. How can I verify this?.
>>
>> You normally have to turn it ON for it to work. *There should be a
>> switch.
>>
>> Check your user's manual, fer cryin' out loud.

On Wed, 13 Aug 2008 18:21:13 -0500, motarola2
<guest@unknown-email.com> wrote:

>you didnt specify which laptop, but normally it is FN + F2.

What brands does "normally" cover. It doesn't cover my Toshiba.

I do see an ethernet controller with a question mark. So, can I assume
that the device driver is not present for this device?. And how can I
know what kind of device it is?. Its vendor type, device type etc. I
am not able to find them out. If I know the vendor type and device
type I can look for the inf in my own machine.

How do I know it is of type network card?. Can I know it in the UI?.
Or should I go to the registry?.


This is what I found in registry :
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\Network\{4D36E972-
E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}\Descriptions]
"WAN Miniport (L2TP)"=hex(7):31,00,00,00,00,00
"WAN Miniport (PPTP)"=hex(7):31,00,00,00,00,00
"WAN Miniport (PPPOE)"=hex(7):31,00,00,00,00,00
"WAN Miniport (IPv6)"=hex(7):31,00,00,00,00,00
"WAN Miniport (IP)"=hex(7):31,00,00,00,00,00
"RAS Async Adapter"=hex(7):31,00,00,00,00,00
"Realtek RTL8101 Family PCI-E Fast Ethernet NIC (NDIS 6.0)"=hex(7):
31,00,00,00,\
00,00
"Microsoft Tun Miniport Adapter"=hex(7):31,00,00,00,00,00
"Microsoft ISATAP Adapter"=hex(7):32,00,00,00,00,00


Thanks




On Aug 14, 12:21*am, motarola2 <gu...@unknown-email.com> wrote:
> well, if it is not listed under network adapters, check if you have a
> cathegory named other devices, if it is it should show as ethernet
> controller.
>
> now, laptops normally have a FN key combination to turn on or off the
> wireless card, if it is off, it will not show under the device manager.
>
> you didnt specify which laptop, but normally it is FN + F2.
>
> --
> motarola2

<persres@googlemail.com> wrote in message
news:ed55ebd3-f532-402e-8513-91eb5ec68761@x41g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
>I do see an ethernet controller with a question mark. So, can I assume
>that the device driver is not present for this device?. And how can I
>know what kind of device it is?. Its vendor type, device type etc. I
>am not able to find them out. If I know the vendor type and device
>type I can look for the inf in my own machine.


You could try right click on the item with yellow? Properties - update
driver and let it search.

Also does it not show up in control panel - network connections - manage
network connections? The lan should show there as well.

persres;804029 Wrote:
> I do see an ethernet controller with a question mark. So, can I assume
> that the device driver is not present for this device?. And how can I
> know what kind of device it is?. Its vendor type, device type etc. I
> am not able to find them out. If I know the vendor type and device
> type I can look for the inf in my own machine.
>
> How do I know it is of type network card?. Can I know it in the UI?.
> Or should I go to the registry?

you can plug in your ethernet cable to your laptop to get internet
access, once you do that open the device manager, right click the
ethernet controller and click update driver, it should try to look for
it using windows update, if it doesnt find results check your invoice
paper work, must be listed there.

i believe there's no way to see it on the registry, at least not an
easy one.

what is your laptop's brand?


--
motarola2

persres@googlemail.com wrote:
> well, well. I certainly have turned it on. Thanks a lot. But my
> question is :
> How do find out what device I have or if I have one at all?.
> Either through the registry or through control panel.
> Thanks
>
> On Aug 14, 12:00 am, Paul Montgomery <nonnymo...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> On Wed, 13 Aug 2008 15:55:11 -0700 (PDT), "pers...@googlemail.com"
>>
>> <pers...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>>> I had purchased a new laptop. I have not been able to connect to
>>> wifi networks. I am beginning to suspect that the laptop may not have
>>> a wifi network card. How can I verify this?.
>> You normally have to turn it ON for it to work. There should be a
>> switch.
>>
>> Check your user's manual, fer cryin' out loud.
>
I have an HP Laptop and there is a little lighted icon (I guess that's
what you would call it) near the upper right corner of my keyboard. I
think it's supposed to look like an antenna. It's "touch" sensitive.
When the WiFi is turned off it's orange. Put your finger on it and it
turns blue and its on!

Big John