topic Re: Laptop can’t see wifi in Broadband & Landline

Laptop can’t see wifi

Mw20242024 — Fri, 02 Feb 2024 16:13:28 GMT

Hi all, fired up my laptop I’ve not used for a while, in fact not used since we got EE broadband a few months ago. Problem is, it can’t pick up the router, it’s working ok - it can see the neighbours ones. All other devices see it ok. It’s running windows 10, I’ve tried a few things I’ve seen on YouTube tutorials but nothing has worked. Is it something to do with it not liking the router or something? I’m not overly tech savvy so please reply as if you’re explaining it to a 5 year old!

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

XRaySpeX — Fri, 02 Feb 2024 16:17:40 GMT

@Mw20242024 : Which router? Have you changed it recently?

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

Mw20242024 — Fri, 02 Feb 2024 19:16:32 GMT

This one, yes, it’s new since the last time I used the laptop.

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

XRaySpeX — Fri, 02 Feb 2024 19:38:45 GMT

What does the label say on it? Is it a Smart Router Plus?

If so, can you log into it & look at the Advanced > Advanced Wireless page & look at the WPA Security Mode? If it is set at WPA3, you probably need to change it to WPA2.

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

Mw20242024 — Mon, 05 Feb 2024 11:31:42 GMT

it's a smarthub sh31b. log into the router you mean? how do i do that? will it affect other devices already logged into it?

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

XRaySpeX — Mon, 05 Feb 2024 16:09:08 GMT

Login to your EE SH/SR at http://192.168.1.254 with the admin password on the bottom of the slider label on the back of the router. Logging into it does not affect the connection of devices.

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

Mamo75 — Thu, 07 Mar 2024 18:05:05 GMT

Hello,

I'm having a similar issue with a brand new Smart Hub Plus, but a bit different.

I switched from BT, and yesterday I installed the hub without problems, then connected my mobile phone, my tablet and the tv. This morning, I connected my work laptop without a hitch, I selected the name of the new EE network and entered the password.

However, now I'm trying to connect my personal laptop (Fujitsu with W10), it shows all my neighbours networks but not my EE.

The only EE network shown in the available is called EE Wifi and it's public. I took a look around the control panel, but couldn't find it. I even restarted the hub, standing with my laptop in front of it. I also tried to connect with the ethernet cable and it works, but I need the wifi. The hub works fine.

To search for a solution, I connected to the public EE wifi, and when I opened the browser, it told me that they transferred my BT credentials to EE.

I've tried to visit the 192.168.1.254 but I can't load the page.

Do you have any suggestions?

Thanks,

Mamo75

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

XRaySpeX — Thu, 07 Mar 2024 18:44:57 GMT

@Mamo75 : I think you'll find the router is set to WiFi6 and/or WPA3. Your lappy probably can't cope with that. Change the router down to WiFi5 and WPA2. You should be able to login to the router at 192.168.1.254 even if it's not connected to BB.

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

Swashbuckler — Fri, 15 Mar 2024 23:55:15 GMT

Nope tried 192.168.1.254 and laptop just says no internet check cables, modem bla bla bla

So frustrating as I’m studying and bt was fine but changed me over to EE. The helpline no one answers, just puts me on hold with torturous gen z music

anyone else gets a solution to this total mare please share it on here

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

RR2000 — Sat, 16 Mar 2024 05:33:48 GMT

If you’re trying to login the router wirelessly then try using the Ethernet cable and you should be able to get to the router interface and try what @XRaySpeX suggested

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

DJPROCTOR — Sun, 07 Apr 2024 20:53:03 GMT

A friend is also having this very problem.

Ethernet connection to the router works and I’ve logged into the routers IP and adjusted the settings mentioned here and the router is on WiFi5, WPA2 with 2.4Ghz checked and still it’s not showing after a solid reboot.

The device trying to connect is only a 2.4Ghz WiFi card. But still as a tech person I can’t work out what’s happened.

Windows 10, all drivers up to date including the RealTek WiFi card and the machines had a full reinstall of Windows and factory reset to ensure it’s not something someone did before with the computer over the years.

Any solution? Seems a few channels here have reported this.

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

colsearle — Sun, 02 Jun 2024 07:02:06 GMT

I tackled this yesterday when I visited a customer with an older Toshiba C850 laptop. The machine had a Realtek 2.4Ghz WiFi card.

I tried setting the router to WiFi 5 and WPA as well as different channels to no avail.

I ended up swapping out the WiFi card for an Intel AC-7260 which connected with no problems. Router set back to WiFi 6 WPA 2.

Cheers

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

JimM11 — Sun, 02 Jun 2024 07:22:31 GMT

@colsearle Did you try to just disable the 5ghz band then connect the older device?

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

colsearle — Sun, 02 Jun 2024 07:31:37 GMT

No I guess I didn't see much point as his older WIFI card could only see 2.4Ghz.

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

JimM11 — Sun, 02 Jun 2024 08:00:54 GMT

@colsearle Let us know if the customer start's to have issue's dropping wi-fi with the card you have installed.

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

neilmat1971 — Mon, 25 Nov 2024 16:50:17 GMT

Hey!

My GF's laptop didn't show my new EE smarthub WiFi, Changed it down from WiFi 6 to WiFi 5 and it worked. Doing this didn't effect 3 mobile phones connection or my laptops.

Thanks

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

XRaySpeX — Mon, 25 Nov 2024 16:53:32 GMT

@neilmat1971 : Thanks! You're welcome 🙂 ! Glad I could be of assistance & trust it is now sorted.

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

David-S — Mon, 10 Mar 2025 18:04:21 GMT

Had a very similar problem with a 10 year old Dell laptop I had upgraded to Win 10. Eventually found that the driver for the built-in Intel AC 7260 wifi adaptor has a bug that prevented it from working with wifi 6 connections. Intel created an updated driver that fixed this but for some reason the update is not easy to find and Windows 10 claims that the one it is using is the latest version (via Device Manager). Similarly, deleting the driver and allowing Windows to find and reinstall it just brings back the same faulty version. I eventually found a site that explained that the 7260 was considered obsolete by Intel and they were no longer supporting it and had pulled the latest driver - don't know if this is true but it fits the evidence. This website said that they had downloaded the latest set of 7260 drivers before Intel pulled them and they provided links to their onedrive to download them. I'm always dubious about downloading executable files from the Internet but these were found on an Intel Community site and I didn't have much to lose as the laptop was now unusable, After virus checking the files the site proved genuine and installing this new 7260 driver, via an official Inter update package, made everything work as it should. So, problem solved. I'm not going to give the link but if you search for 'intel wifi "AC 7260" problem wifi6 router' and Intel Community you should find it if its still there.

If you cant find the updated driver then you can maybe downgrade the router to work with wifi 5 instead of wifi 6 - but this seems a retrograde step !

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

redvictor1 — Sat, 29 Mar 2025 19:08:31 GMT

David -S, just confirming that the latest driver from that website works on the issue with windows 7 not recognising WIFI-6 on my Dell Latitude E7740. It literally wouldn't see the EE smart hub plus router I had installed. This router will NOT downgrade to WIFI-5, so don't bother trying that, or any of the "other" fixes i've seen on the web. Do what's below and it's a 100% fix for this issue.

The driver version needed for the Intel dual band wireless AC-7260 is 18.33.17.1 and that comes in the downloaded package of bluetooth and wifi v20.10.1 that is available on the website with the search above. Look for the WIFI v21.10.1 64bit for windows 7 download. There is a 32 bit version and also versions for windows 10 and 11. We tried the BT v20.10.1 but that only had the same version of the AC7260 as i had already.

Huge kudos to the guy who had the foresight to download those updates from Intel before they dropped them. He has saved me (and a bunch of others) a ton of extra time and money. The beauty of Google eh folks...

Re: Laptop can’t see wifi

Matt_124 — Sun, 30 Mar 2025 01:20:59 GMT

For future reference for anyone coming across similar issues, the Compatible WiFi feature built in to the EE Hub allows a separate SSID to be created which should solve any issues with not being able to be found or connected to by these older devices.