In this article, we will take a closer look at the process of connecting a laptop or computer running Windows 7 to the Internet via Wi-Fi. I think the article will be useful to many, since the first time you connect to Wi-Fi, there are always many questions. As a rule, they are associated with installing the necessary drivers, enabling a wireless adapter on a laptop, etc. More on this later.
The laptop is generally a great thing. I don't really understand the people who buy desktop computers now. Except for serious games. Well, you see, it's much more convenient with a laptop. If you want a large screen, then you can connect it to a monitor or TV. It is quiet and you can take it with you if necessary. And yet, all modern (and not so) laptops have a built-in Wi-Fi module. A receiver that allows you to connect your laptop to the Internet via a wireless Wi-Fi network. In the case of a desktop computer, you will need to purchase a USB (or PCI) Wi-Fi receiver.
All you need is to buy and install a Wi-Fi router (if you don't already have one), it will distribute Wi-Fi to which you connect your laptop. You can connect your computer to a free Wi-Fi network in cafes, shops, etc. Or, to your neighbor's unsecured network 🙂 It's much more convenient than laying a network cable. While this is still normal for an ordinary stationary computer, it is not the same for a laptop. And it is not convenient to move around the house all the time with this wire.
It's not difficult to connect a laptop to the Internet, but provided that the Wi-Fi driver is installed. Many people have a lot of problems because of the driver. If you simply did not install the driver on your Wi-Fi receiver, or you yourself installed Windows and did not install it, then you will not be able to connect to Wi-Fi. But, perhaps you already have everything installed and configured, therefore, first, let's look at the process of a regular connection to a wireless network. If you do not learn, there will be no wireless connection, etc., then read the article to the end, we will consider possible problems.
We connect the laptop to Wi-Fi
Let's first look at the connection process without any settings and checks there. Why complicate things, maybe you already have everything set up. If all is well, your laptop sees a wireless network and is ready to connect, then the Internet connection icon in the notification bar will look like this:
The connection status, which looks like the network level with an asterisk (as in the picture above), indicates that the laptop sees available networks and is ready to connect to them. Click on this icon, then select the Wi-Fi network to which we need to connect and press the button Connection... In Windows 10, the process for connecting to Wi-Fi is slightly different. If necessary, detailed instructions are here.
If the network is protected by a password, a window will appear in which you need to enter the password and confirm the connection by clicking the button Ok.
That's it, your laptop should be connected to the Wi-Fi network. The connection status will be like this:
You can use the internet.
If you see the connection status "No connections available", it looks like this:
This means that everything is most likely configured on your laptop, but the laptop simply does not see the networks available for connection. Perhaps there is simply no coverage in this place. If you are connecting to your network, then check if the router is turned on. If enabled, then try restarting it.
I wrote about the solution to this problem in a separate article: there are no available connections in Windows.
This is how the connection will go when you have the driver installed on the Wi-Fi adapter and the adapter itself is turned on. But very often the adapter on the laptop is turned off, or no one has installed the driver on it at all. In such cases, many questions arise. Now we will analyze in detail both cases, due to which you may have problems connecting your laptop to a wireless network.
Turn on "Wireless Network Connection" on the laptop
If your wireless connection is disabled, or the driver for Wi-Fi is not installed, then the connection status will look like this:
This means that there is no way to connect to the Internet via Wi-Fi, and there is no connection via a network cable. As I wrote above, this happens because the adapter is turned off, or because of the lack of a driver. Let's first check if your "Wireless Network Connection" is turned off. This, of course, is unlikely, unless you turned it off yourself, but you need to check it.
Click on the internet connection icon, and select Network and Sharing Center.
Then choose Change adapter settings.
We look at the adapter "Wireless network connection", if it is disabled, then right-click on it and select Enable.
After that, the connection status "There are available connections" should appear (if there is a Wi-Fi network in the radius).
Turn on wireless connections with the buttons on the laptop
It seems to me that now manufacturers do not install separate buttons to turn on the Wi-Fi adapter. But, if you are having problems connecting to Wi-Fi, then charmingly check if there is a dedicated button to disable / enable wireless connections on your laptop. I know for sure that Toshiba loved to make such switches.
Now, on laptops, to disable / enable the wireless network, they use a keyboard shortcut. As a rule, different manufacturers have different keys. But usually it is Fn + F2... So on Asus laptops. For yourself, you can see that there should be a network icon on the key that is pressed together with Fn. Something like this:
True, my combination of these buttons is responsible for turning off Bluetooth. It doesn't seem to react to Wi-Fi. But, you may be different. It is definitely worth checking.
If there is no "Wireless Network Connection" adapter at all in the adapter management window, but there is definitely Wi-Fi on your computer / laptop, then this means that the driver is not installed on the Wi-Fi adapter.
Now we will check everything and try to solve this problem.
Checking and installing the driver on Wi-Fi
I have not yet seen a case that after installing Windows 7, the system itself installed the driver on the Wi-Fi adapter. Windows 8 is much better at this. Windows 10 often installs the necessary drivers by itself. So, after installing Windows, in order to use Wi-Fi, you need to install a driver specifically for your laptop, or adapter (very often, adapters from different manufacturers are installed in the same laptop model. It is because of this that you can see several drivers on Wi -Fi, on the manufacturer's website).
We go to the device manager.
In the device manager, open the tab Network adapters, and we are looking for a driver for Wi-Fi. I have it called Atheros AR9485WB-EG Wireless Network Adapter, it is installed. You should also have something like Wireless Network Adapter.
If you don't have a wireless connection, then most likely you will not find an adapter either. You need to install the driver, then Wi-Fi will work. And yet, if the driver is not installed on the Wireless Network Adapter, then there will be at least one unknown device with a yellow exclamation mark in the device manager. It looks something like this:
This is most likely the same Wireless adapter with which the laptop does not know how to work.
Driver Installation
All you need to do is download the correct driver and install it. It is best to download the driver from the official website of the manufacturer of your laptop / adapter, and for your laptop model (or adapter). Best of all, search through Google for the official website of your laptop, for example Asus, then use the website search, indicating the model of your laptop. Most likely, your computer's page will be found, open it and look for downloads of utilities and drivers there. Find the driver on Wireless and download it for the operating system you need.
Most likely, the driver will be in the archive. To install, run the .exe file from the archive. For example, an archive with a driver for my laptop:
After installing the driver, restart the laptop and try to connect to the wireless network, according to the instructions. I wrote in more detail about installing the driver in the article on installing the driver on a Wi-Fi adapter in Windows 7.
If some points from the article remained incomprehensible to you, or you did not manage to connect your computer to Wi-Fi, then write about it in the comments, we will try to solve your problem.
