Anyone else seeing this?

Windoze insisted on an update yesterday, and since then, the internet connection(WiFi6) keeps dropping off every couple of hours.

Before the update, the connection was there forever.

Trying to reconnect fails, the troubleshooter says it has no idea what is going on, switch the WiFi adaptor off and on again does not fix it - the ONLY way I have found to force it to work, is a full reboot of the computer, THEN it works OK again for a few more hours then drops off again.

VERY infuriating, as I have heaps of website open in my browser, and a plethora of applications all running at the same time, and a full reboot is a pain in the arse - I leave my machine on 24/7, and just switch the monitors off at night.

....and this was not an issue at all before the last W10 update.

Anyone else seeing this problem by any chance?

THIS is the update that seems to be screwing with things.

I COULD uninstall this update, but then Windoze will just bloody-well download it again and force me back into the same problem UNLESS there is a way to PREVENT this specific update from coming down the internet pipeline again....
Edited 2025-04-17 18:56 by Grogster

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Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops!

Hi Grogster, All,

Have you got a spare wifi dongle? Try it and disable the existing one and see if it improves things at all.

It may be that the old win 10 driver for your existing wifi is not fully compatible with win 11.

Regards,

Mick. (The big one)



.

I do, but......I'm not running W11, I'm on W10 - it was a W10 update...  

Hi Grogster,

OK, but same deal, the driver may not be compatible fully with the new update, it may work with a different dongle.

If you have a spare wifi dongle try it and disable to one that is playing up.

Regards,

Mick (The big One)



.

MIGHT have a hardware failure in progress here.
WiFi is now dropping off every 60-75 minutes, and NOTHING gets it back, except a full reboot.  So I am having to do a full reboot basically every hour now, to keep the Internet access working - it's nuts.  

I have found that plenty of people are having the same issue - this page describes EXACTLY what is happening to me.

Another thread said to turn off the power management on my WiFi, so I have disabled W10 power-management on my WiFi adaptor now, and I am keeping my fingers crossed.  It was enabled("Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power")

I still think the latest update did this, but HOPEFULLY......

My little machine is a NUC-ish, MSI mini-PC thing, and many of these kinds of box, are thought to be Laptops by Windows, and so it often tries to force it's power-saving rules on them.

Will keep the thread posted.

Nope, that didn't fix it - just had to reboot again.
I wonder if the WiFi adaptor in this thing is starting to fail.
But it seems a bit odd, that it is now a pretty predictable failure.
Having just rebooted, and it is 11:11PM, I will expect it to fail about 25 past Midnight - if I am still up, but I might just go to bed at this point.

I do have another WiFi adaptor in the form of an external AP that should arrive in the next day or so, so I will set that up, and just disable the internal WiFi and see if THAT fixes my Internet issues.

At least with an external AP, it rules out Windoze diddling with the internal adaptor, cos Bill should not be able to disable the external AP....

Yes, I have the same issue that started immediately after the last windows update.  I tried a range of fixes but in the end it was dive into device manager and simply re-enable the network adaptor.  Back on line again.

Yep, tried THAT too, but not even THAT is working.
It's full-reboot or nothing, every hour now, and it is getting old rather quickly at this point, I must say....

EDIT: @ Mick and others - yes, I did get around to updating the WiFi drivers.  There WAS an update from earlier this month for my WiFi adaptor, so I was hopeful that would have fixed the issue as hinted at, but nope....still forced to reboot about six times a day now if I want to stay online.

Hopefully, the new external AP I have ordered, will get around this issue.
If not, might have to look much more seriously at Linux, cos GENERALLY SPEAKING, you just don't have these kinds of issue - probably as you are not force-fed updates that tend to screw with some obscure thing in Windoze that causes these kinds of issues that not even MS themselves understand why they happen at this point.

But at least with Linux, YOU choose if you want to do updates and...well....pretty much ANYTHING system-wise, it's in YOUR hands, not the MS updater.

STOP GRAEME!!!!
You're off on a rant again....  
Edited 2025-04-29 10:42 by Grogster

I've had Win 10 updates recently and (touch wood) nothing seems to have broken. I rather hope it doesn't as this is one of those PCs that comes with a back-up copy of Windows on a partition and no installation CD/DVDs are provided. One of the few advantages of having less than 58GB for drive C: is that you aren't encouraged to keep much stuff on it. :)

  Grogster said  

Yep, tried THAT too, but not even THAT is working.
It's full-reboot or nothing, every hour now, and it is getting old rather quickly at this point, I must say....

]

Yes, after I got the adaptor working, the same pattern continued an hour or so later.  It really is most frustrating.

Device Manager says my network adaptor is a Realtek 8821CE Wireless LAN 802.11ac PCI-E NIC. Are we having trouble with the same adaptor?
Edited 2025-04-29 22:50 by circuit

I googled Realtek 8821CE Wireless LAN 802.11ac PCI-E NIC

Some discussion on Reddit. A recent one offerer this.


Had issues with this driver. Found the solution by going into Device manager > The Device > Properties > Advanced > Preferred band > 5G.

had it selected as no preferred band and it'd just randomly switch between 2.4G and 5G.

@ circuit: No, my adaptor is an Intel 6E AX211 series.
@ disco4now: GOOD IDEA, I will try that.

...just rebooted AGAIN now, to get the Internet back so I could reply to this thread.

I setup another NUC box beside this one with the Internet connection issue, installed MX Linux KDE(23.6) on it, connected to the same WiFi.....it's been playing me music from YouTube for hours now, never drops off, and this is still just on the LIVE-USB version on lesser hardware.  

Nope, still drops off, even though I set it to 5GHz.    

That was a good idea though.

Maybe it's the 5GHz signal that is weak, try locking it to 2.4GHz.
Edited 2025-05-01 10:43 by phil99

Another good idea!  
Will try that also.

Nope, still dropping off.

On the plus side, it has rekindled my interest in Linux, and have been happily reading my way through the excellent MX Linux user manual, on the other box, beside this problem W10 one.

I did a full-install of MX Linux to SSD tonight, and it is pretty good, once liberated from the constrains of running as a live-USB.    

As a matter of interest, which desktop did you choose? I've had KDE Plasma running pretty well on a fanless box, despite it being the heavyweight of the family.

KDE.

I actually chose KDE/Plasma, as I thought it was more lightweight then Xfce!  
Am I wrong in that?

But I DO like the KDE/Plasma GUI, cos it is SIMPLE and effective.
No bells and whistles, it just gives you a simple GUI to work with.

To me, SPEED and efficiency are more important then eye-candy....

Oh, and W10 is STILL dropping off every hour....
Kinda nutty, to have to reboot the machine every hour, to get the net back.

But this HAS allowed me to play with MX Linux A-LOT over the last few days.
When the W10 box drops off, I basically ignore it at this point, cos the MX box IS on-line and I can play music etc via YouTube, while I continue to read the MX Linux manual.

I COULD sign-in to the forums, as I have Opera Browser also installed and working now, but I have not made the final decision to move - yet.

I HAVE ordered more computer parts, to build a more permanent MX Linux box though.

The MX version of Plasma is getting on a bit, but it's still the most configurable of the three. XFCE is designed to be lightweight and efficient, usually better for low powered hardware. It's less configurable though. I must admit that I like Plasma personally as I'm drawn to shiny stuff. :)  I'm running it on a low power fanless PC with only 4GB of RAM and less than 70GB for C: but it's fine so I can't really see the point in me changing to XFCE. I might give MX the entire 70GB though, and use D: for /home.

The Brave browser runs fine on MX too.