New Dell 1390 WiFi card Works - Part of the time!

Swapped out my wifi card and got nothing in OSX or XP! Took it apart and swapped the antenna wire to agree with to colors on the card and everything works. Then I shut it down and now back to no card recognized in either OS. Took out the battery and replaced and it worked again. Then it quit again when shut down. Once it start is works perfectly never stopping except when the computer is off and then it will not be recognized in either OS. Do I have a bad card or something else going on here??? Can not find a pattern as sometime it can be shut down and restarted and all is fine.

 

do you have any problems with your original card not working after a shut down?

 

No problems with that one. I think it must be the card. I am receiving a replacement and we shall see.

 

Did you ever solve this because I am having the exact same problem with the 1390 card I just received? It either works perfectly, or it isn't detected at all... Anyone else?

 

I had a Dell 1390 that I swapped out that behaved exactly like this. Turns out that I had not seated it correctly when I installed it. It took me 3 more tries to finally figure this out.

Make sure when you seat the card into the slot, that you hear it click in solidly. If not, it will sometimes work, sometimes not. At least mine behaved just like that until I finally figured it out.

The way to be absolutely sure it's inserted all the way in is to slide the card in at a 45 degree angle, lay it down, put the screw in to hold it in the corner of the card, but DON'T TIGHTEN it all the way. Then get something big and heavy and flat and push on the right side of the wifi card until you feel a solid click. Then it's clicked in. Now tighten the screw down all the way.

Do it that way and you shouldn't have any problems hopefully. At least I haven't had issues since I installed it this way.

 

Was a bad card. Got a replacement and all is well now.

 

Thanks guys.. If I tried to seat it any tighter I'm afraid I'd snap the connector off the motherboard. I guess I'll order a new card.

 

In case anyone else has this strange part time 1390 problem, I have just replaced the 1390 with a new 1490 and all is working perfectly. So many people have 1390 cards that are working fine so it must have been a faulty card.