hdd upgrade to ssd and larger battery, Win10 no longer recognizes wifi

ma.danbo

Commendable
Aug 6, 2018
7
0
1,510
I upgraded my 2013 Dell XPS 15 9530 from the crappy dysfunctional configuration in which I bought it to an amazingly fast and long-lived SSD/9-cell battery config, which was the other config available at the time, and incidentally the only one that actually worked as advertised.

It went smoothly -- read a ton of forums, watched videos, had the procedure down cold before cracking the case. But now Windows doesn't recognize that there is even a Wifi card installed. I broke the case back open and reseated the card, tried to see if there were any loose cables but found none. The power cord to the new battery looks a little dubious, but I haven't even run it on battery power yet.

Any ideas?

I should add that since the upgrade the fan runs at full blast all the time.
 

Ralston18

Titan
Moderator
Does the case feel warmer/hotter than usual. "Usual" being pre-upgrades of the HDD->SSD and the addition of the 9 cell battery.

Does the battery feel very hot?

Any error messages or warnings regarding wireless connectivity?

Have you tried downloading and reinstalling the applicable wireless adapter drivers via the manufacturer's website?

And do take a close look at the "dubious" power cord and associated connections. Physically check the cables. The cables may look okay but actually could be loose or not fully in place.
 

ma.danbo

Commendable
Aug 6, 2018
7
0
1,510


The battery is actually quite cool. The heat is coming from the back half of the laptop (under the keyboard.) You can see it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSkoQ8Oayw8&vl=en. It may be the memory, but more likely the area behind it (towards the hinge.)

I installed the drivers from the manufacturer again, but there's nothing to do -- the device manager shows no wifi card, even no hidden wifi card. Hooking up a USB 3.0 > Gigabit Ethernet dongle works fine, appears in the device manager as expected.
 

ma.danbo

Commendable
Aug 6, 2018
7
0
1,510
In case anyone happens on this, it turns out that it was the active cooling while plugged in that was so fan-heavy; passive cooling on battery didn't make a sound. And I think that the wifi not being found was the result of my putting a screw in one of the battery holes directly that was actually meant to be passed through from the outside of the case (under the small hinged plate) and into the battery screwhole and then into the motherboard itself. I also jiggled stuff around, so it could have been something else, but that was the only certain change I made.