Wifi and bluetooth icons disappeared A517-52G

CaroDe

Hi,

I am having issues with my Acer Aspire 5 connecting to Wifi. Over night the wifi and bluetooth icons disappeared from the taskbar, as well as the search for available networks.

I tried several tips and tricks I found online, including troubleshooter, looking for them in device manager, searching network adaptors, cmd reset of winsocks etc with no luck.

I have also tried to manually download wifi driver from the acer website but not sure I got the correct ones. I used my SNID to look for available drivers for my model and it returned the correct model. There are three options for wireless LAN called 1) Wireless LAN Driver (Vendor:MTK), 2) Wireless LAN Driver (AX201) (Vendor:Intel) and 3) Wireless LAN Driver (NFA344 HAI) (Vendor: Atheros). I went with the second option, since I have an Intel Core i5. I downloaded the driver on a different computer, transferred by USB drive and then installed the .INF file from my Desktop and then restarted the computer. Unfortunately this did not work either and I could not find the newly installed driver in the Network adapter list of the Device Manager. After more google search I found that there is an option in the Device Manager to display hidden Network adapters, which I did and then found a) Bluetooth Device (personal area network) and b) MediaTek Wireless LAN card - both of which have a status of :"Currently this hardware device is not connected to the computer (Code 45)" - however the driver is not listed, I guess because it was either not the right one or because of hardware issues with the LAN card.

At this point I am stuck and would like to ask the Acer community for help.

Is this likely to be a software issue (e.g. I chose the wrong drivers) or a hardware issue (Wireless LAN card damaged?)? Does anyone have any advice what I could do to remedy the issues of the hardware device not being connected to the computer or what else I could try?

Thank you!

( Edited the title to add the model name )

Commodore_1995#

What is the exact model? Example A315-53-58VH.

CaroDe

The model is A517-52G

Commodore_1995#

Are there any drivers with problems in the device manager? What is the bios version?

William_mk2

@CaroDe

Sometimes a simple system restore will fix the issue.. 

Try windows x

click on power shell admin or command prompt admin 

type rstrui

chose an earlier date on which your computer was working fine  

click on next, finish, yes

It will restore your computer to an earlier date 

if you get an message - system restore not completed - click on close 

It will show you all the icons..

Try and check whether it is working now ..

If it is still not working then we have to do a refresh and reset

click on start - settings - update and security - recovery - reset this pc - get started 

or 

on start - type here to search - type reset this pc - click on reset this pc on the top - click on get started 

It will show you keep my files and remove everything

chose keep my files 

chose the account - type the password - click on local reinstall - click on reset 

It will be in progress.. 

login to computer and start using the computer. 

If it is still not working 

click on start - settings - update and security - recovery - reset this pc - get started 

chose remove everything 

click on local reinstall - just remove my files - click on reset

It will be in progress

Note:

If you do refresh ( keep my files ) - all your personal files like pictures, music , documents , videos will still be intact.  Only the applications will be lost

If you do reset ( remove everything ) - you are doing a factory default.  It will become like a day one computer.  It will wipe out everything and take your computer to day one like a new computer. 

You can also do the recovery in an alternative way..

There are two alt keys on the keyboard. If you look at the bottom row of keyboard you can see the one on the left side of space bar and the other on the right side of space bar. The alt key on the right side will be looking like alt, alt gr or alt car. Turn off the computer. Hold the alt key on the left and tap f10 continuously.  It will go to repair mode. It will show you chose an option, continue, troubleshoot.  If it is not going to repair mode, turn off the computer. Turn on the computer. Hold the right alt key ( alt gr or alt car or alt ) and then tap f10 continuously. It will go to chose an option continue and troubleshoot..

It will show you chose an option, continue, troubleshoot

Go to troubleshoot - click on reset this pc

click on keep my files ( only applications will be lost )  chose your account and type your password  - click on local reinstall - click on reset

It will be in progress 

If the keep my files option is not working 

Go to troubleshoot - click on reset this pc – click on remove everything – click on local reinstall – just remove my files – click on reset 

It will reinstall windows. 

If the just remove my files is not working.. 

Go to troubleshoot - click on reset this pc – click on remove everything – click on local reinstall – Fully clean the drive – click on reset 

It will reinstall windows. 

Note: You can also go to chose an option , continue , troubleshoot by holding the alt key + tapping f10 or alt gr + tapping f10 on the keyboard while turning on the computer.  Once you see the troubleshoot option, you can stop tapping the f10 and stop holding the alt key.  Then you can try the keep my files and remove everything ( just remove by files and fully clean the drive ) by following the steps which was mentioned above.