Help with T42 Thinkpad laptop Wifi

[sdt]

Hi i have an old thinkpad lying around. Its wifi works fine on linux mint and windows 7 but it has trouble with wifi in windows xp for some reason. The wifi card is 2200BG.

 

Ive removed network services component in windows add/remove components and added a static IP address it has helped in that once the machine cold boots it doesnt lose the wifi connection.

 

But then im wondering if there is some setting which can make it easily reconnect once it wakes up from sleep without having to restart it.

 

It is on windows wireless config, not Thinkpads Access connections. All drivers/firmware are updated.

[Monroe]

I have two T42 Thinkpads and there are problems with the WI-Fi drivers as I remember from 2012 when setting up Windows XP. I bought a Netgear card (WG511 v2) ... very cheap from an Amazon seller and like it better in my T42.

 

To make the Thinkpad Wi-Fi work I found a solution from others having the same problem ... the latest driver has to replaced with an older driver ... also do not download any WI-Fi driver from the MS update. They have an IBM driver there under Other Software or something and it will take off the old driver and put the newer driver back on and screw everything up ... at least it did on my machine.

 

You will need to search around on Google and the Thinkpad forum ... you may not have the same problem that I had ... my Wi-Fi works fine but I like using the Netgear card in the PCMIA slot better ... will pick up more signals.

 

Thinkpad T42 Wi-Fi search on Google:

 

http://www.google.com/search?q=thinkpad+t42+XP+wifi+problem&btnG=Search&complete=0&hl=en&gbv=1&spell=1

 

 

https://www.google.com/search?num=100&safe=off&complete=0&hl=en&gbv=2&q=thinkpad+t42+wi-fi+problem+need+older+driver&oq=thinkpad+t42+wi-fi+problem+need+older+driver&gs_l=serp.12...0.0.0.5053.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0..0.0....0...1c..55.serp..0.0.0.uVoQAE_QwNs

 

It took me awhile to get it figured out ... maybe this will get you started but you're problem may be something different ... someone on Google or the Thinkpad forum may have the same problem.

...

Edited October 11, 2014 by monroe

[sdt]

I have two T42 Thinkpads and there are problems with the WI-Fi drivers as I remember from 2012 when setting up Windows XP. I bought a Netgear card (WG511 v2) ... very cheap from an Amazon seller and like it better in my T42.

 

To make the Thinkpad Wi-Fi work I found a solution from others having the same problem ... the latest driver has to replaced with an older driver ... also do not download any WI-Fi driver from the MS update. They have an IBM driver there under Other Software or something and it will take off the old driver and put the newer driver back on and screw everything up ... at least it did on my machine.

 

You will need to search around on Google and the Thinkpad forum ... you may not have the same problem that I had ... my Wi-Fi works fine but I like using the Netgear card in the PCMIA slot better ... will pick up more signals.

 

Thinkpad T42 Wi-Fi search on Google:

 

http://www.google.com/search?q=thinkpad+t42+XP+wifi+problem&btnG=Search&complete=0&hl=en&gbv=1&spell=1

 

 

https://www.google.com/search?num=100&safe=off&complete=0&hl=en&gbv=2&q=thinkpad+t42+wi-fi+problem+need+older+driver&oq=thinkpad+t42+wi-fi+problem+need+older+driver&gs_l=serp.12...0.0.0.5053.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0..0.0....0...1c..55.serp..0.0.0.uVoQAE_QwNs

 

It took me awhile to get it figured out ... maybe this will get you started but you're problem may be something different ... someone on Google or the Thinkpad forum may have the same problem.

...

 

 

i've made note of the older drivers here http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/MIGR-54046.html thanks to your link but the lenovo site is down for maintenance will try this when its up.

 

I'm using a wifi stick from netgear too. Lets hope this works out.

[Monroe]

From what I remember over 2 1/2 years ago ... the part about going back to an older driver was on the Thinkpad forum. I have been searching around and can't spot any talk about it. Perhaps IBM or Lenovo fixed or released a newer working driver since then.

 

I seem to remember as I searched ... there were many people having problems with the WiFi on the T42 notebook. I had the Netgear card working and after a few more months of searching finally found the solution to the T42 WiFi working. So I have two ways to connect with WiFi ... I have the IBM T42 internal WiFi turned off and use the Netgear card.

 

After I got everything working to my satisfaction ... I made an image backup of both machines ... never going to have that problem again.

 

This is the Netgear card that I bought ... you don't have to buy it ... I had an older Netgear card to use for Windows 98 but it didn't seem to work well with XP so I got a few of these cards ... they were $15 then for new ... today I see the price is $5.25 ... it looks like a new sealed card but it might be used.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Netgear-WG511V2-54Mbps-802-11g-Wireless/dp/B003HY35O4

 

I also found the card here at Amazon for $59.33 from another seller ... After I tried it out on my T42 XP setup and it worked OK ... I bought 3 or 4 more to use and have some "spares" in case one of my cards went bad ... newer notebooks no longer have these PCMIA slots, I think ... don't know for sure with "all" newer notebooks ... so I figured these cards were no longer going to be made, wanted to play safe. I have used this card like crazy many times every day for years and it still works just fine ... I guess better to be safe than sorry and have a spare or two.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Netgear-Mbps-Wireless-Card-WG511/dp/B003WT3IB4/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1413104941&sr=8-2&keywords=Netgear+WG511V2

 

Your Netgear stick should work ... just check the latest drivers for XP I guess.

 

*** Just to add ... that first card being sold for $5.25 looks to be new ... it says "fullfilled by Amazon" and it looks just like what I bought in 2012 ... the box and everything. I would say it is a never used product ... but not 100% sure ... in case anyone else might want this kind of Netgear card for an XP setup.

 

There is an answer out there somewhere.

...

Edited October 12, 2014 by monroe

[Monroe]

Starting a new post ... the other is long enough. I missed that about Windows 7 in your first post ... that Netgear card will not work with Windows 7 ... I think ... so with Windows 7 and XP on one computer probably something more "modern" is the answer ... I only have XP on my notebooks.

 

I found this at the Major Geeks forum:

 

The first link in the answer by Squeaner does still work and you might want to download it and save it in a folder ... maybe it will be useful, maybe not.

 

thinkpad t42 wireless problem

 

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=210783

 

 

*** just to add ... perhaps someone else with a Thinkpad T42 can be of help to you. I just pulled one of the Netgear WG511 v2 boxes out of storage ... it says it will work with Windows 98SE, ME, 2000 Professional and XP ... no Windows 7 mentioned.

 

However, this card did not work very well for me with Windows 98SE ... it was hit and miss, maybe the Netgear drivers were at fault for this newer card ... when I used an older Netgear card with Windows 98SE, everything worked great.

 

That's when I decided to put XP on my T42 notebooks ... that was a good move ... I thinks this card had better drivers for XP, seems to be flawless. Just my observations.

...

Edited October 12, 2014 by monroe

[sdt]

Starting a new post ... the other is long enough. I missed that about Windows 7 in your first post ... that Netgear card will not work with Windows 7 ... I think ... so with Windows 7 and XP on one computer probably something more "modern" is the answer ... I only have XP on my notebooks.

I found this at the Major Geeks forum:

The first link in the answer by Squeaner does still work and you might want to download it and save it in a folder ... maybe it will be useful, maybe not.

thinkpad t42 wireless problem

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=210783

*** just to add ... perhaps someone else with a Thinkpad T42 can be of help to you. I just pulled one of the Netgear WG511 v2 boxes out of storage ... it says it will work with Windows 98SE, ME, 2000 Professional and XP ... no Windows 7 mentioned.

However, this card did not work very well for me with Windows 98SE ... it was hit and miss, maybe the Netgear drivers were at fault for this newer card ... when I used an older Netgear card with Windows 98SE, everything worked great.

That's when I decided to put XP on my T42 notebooks ... that was a good move ... I thinks this card had better drivers for XP, seems to be flawless. Just my observations.

...

lower version has made it much better! not perfect but i need to restart considerably less.