iBook G4 Wireless Problems

[chillined1212]

Hello! I am here today looking for help with my ibook. I recently updated the software from 10.3 to 10.4. The wireless was working fine on 10.3. Then when I upgraded it it just stopped working. Now it says there is no airport card installed. I need to fix it because I need it for school! Please help with whatever way you can. I always come to you people when I have a problem because I know that you can fix it. thanks

 

[Makosuke]

I assume when you say it says there's no card installed you're getting that from System Profiler, and not just the Network pref pane; if that's the case, the most obvious cause would be that by some bizarre coincidence the card either came loose or stopped working at the same time you upgraded--I don't suppose you added RAM or messed with something else under the keyboard at the same time? (Can't hurt to pop it and re-check, either way.)

Assuming that's not it (or if it does show up in Profiler but the Network pref pane doesn't show it anywhere), I'd start by running the hardware test disc that came with it just to see if it tells you anything useful (I'm not sure if those let you know if there's an Airport card installed or not, but it'd at least let you know if something was acting up).

Doing a PMU (and PRAM) reset is another thing to try, in case some firmware goof up knocked it out:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1431
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379

If none of that helps, do you have a bootable 10.3 backup around that you could boot from to make sure it's showing up? If not and you do have a firewire drive available, installing 10.3 on it is time-consuming but would tell you for sure if it's your 10.4 install that's messed up or if something else is going on.

Otherwise you're down to an OS reinstall in hopes that something got messed up during the upgrade--did you do an upgrade install, or archive and install? The former occasionally has problems, so if so maybe an Archive and Install is in order.

 

[chillined1212]

I assume when you say it says there's no card installed you're getting that from System Profiler, and not just the Network pref pane; if that's the case, the most obvious cause would be that by some bizarre coincidence the card either came loose or stopped working at the same time you upgraded--I don't suppose you added RAM or messed with something else under the keyboard at the same time? (Can't hurt to pop it and re-check, either way.)

Assuming that's not it (or if it does show up in Profiler but the Network pref pane doesn't show it anywhere), I'd start by running the hardware test disc that came with it just to see if it tells you anything useful (I'm not sure if those let you know if there's an Airport card installed or not, but it'd at least let you know if something was acting up).

Doing a PMU (and PRAM) reset is another thing to try, in case some firmware goof up knocked it out:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1431
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379

If none of that helps, do you have a bootable 10.3 backup around that you could boot from to make sure it's showing up? If not and you do have a firewire drive available, installing 10.3 on it is time-consuming but would tell you for sure if it's your 10.4 install that's messed up or if something else is going on.

Otherwise you're down to an OS reinstall in hopes that something got messed up during the upgrade--did you do an upgrade install, or archive and install? The former occasionally has problems, so if so maybe an Archive and Install is in order.

thanks a lot! umm I doesn't show up on system profiler or network preferences! on 10.3 it was working just fine. I didn't touch anything inside! do you know what tools are used and where the airport card is located! It works fine when I plug it into ethernet its just, when I upgrade installed and ran 10.4, it just stopped working! I will try running the hardware disc to see! Hopefully it shows up everything good and then I will do the resets. That was my last resort, was to reinstall the whole thing again, but maby it will help! Thanks so much!