"WiFi: No Hardware Installed" on OS X 10.8

[Justin098]

I have a MacBook 5.1 (Late 2008 model) running on Mountain Lion. Yesterday when I opened it and I can't connect to the internet and I checked the WiFi connection and it said "No Hardware Installed", I tried to turn on the WiFi in the System preferences and it won't work! What should I do?

 

[azentropy]

I have a MacBook 5.1 (Late 2008 model) running on Mountain Lion. Yesterday when I opened it and I can't connect to the internet and I checked the WiFi connection and it said "No Hardware Installed", I tried to turn on the WiFi in the System preferences and it won't work! What should I do?

A few things to try:

1. Reboot and Zap PRAM twice
2. Shutdown and remove battery (can't remember off hand if the battery is removable on that model) and unplug and hold power button for 20 seconds.
3. Repair Disk Permissions
4. Reinstall OS, or at least create a bootable USB to see if it has the issue as well.

Or the card could have just died, in which you would have to repair it or go with and external usb option.

 

[Justin098]

How can I reboot and zap PRAM?

 

[azentropy]

How can I reboot and zap PRAM?

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379

 

[paww]

I have the same model and had this problem after I upgraded to 8.5, I found that it happened occasionally to me only if I put it to sleep whilst on the mains.

Powering down and rebooting it running off the battery seemed to fix it.

 

[Justin098]

But what will happen if I reboot or zap PRAM? Are all my files gonna be deleted?

 

[paww]

But what will happen if I reboot or zap PRAM? Are all my files gonna be deleted?

Nope, the link posted above for you by @azentropy has the info of what PRAM stores

Information stored in NVRAM / PRAM includes:

Speaker volume
Screen resolution
Startup disk selection
Recent kernel panic information, if any