Alari's Journal: HP BIOS update still killing laptop wireless cards

A BIOS update distributed over HP Update is murdering HP laptop wireless cards. HP refuses to admit responsibility or to correct the error in any way. The only solution is to replace the motherboard, which HP will not cover under their warranty. This has been going on for months but I saw another dozen HP laptops with deceased wireless cards this week so I figured I'd mention it again.

BIOS update options

[damn_registrars]

I don't know what kind of BIOS is on the system in question, but is there no way to back up the BIOS before updating it? It would seem if you could do that, you may be able to recover some of those junked systems.

Re:

[Alari]

HP uses a modified BIOS, I don't know what the base is, probably one of the common ones though. In most of those, you can enable or disable specific devices, like, say, wireless cards. But HP hides those options. That doesn't necessarily mean the code is removed though. (I don't know either way...) What I suspect is happening is that those options are in the code just not displayed, and that HP's BIOS update disables the wireless device somehow. But that's all speculation.

Whatever is happening, HP's BIOS up