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Author Topic: Laptop stuck in "Airplane" mode  (Read 3900 times)

kyrathaba

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Laptop stuck in "Airplane" mode
« on: September 06, 2016, 05:31 PM »
I have a HP Pavilion 17-g121wm laptop that says it's in Airplane mode but in actuality wireless is connected to internet. I can't get Airplane mode to actually work. The following screenshot shows Airplane mode ON and Wireless greyed out, yet I am connected the internet and posting this. In Settings, I try to toggle the Airplane mode toggle without success. It's stuck in the ON position. Again, though, the PC is not truly in airplane mode. I'm connected. I tried uninstalling my network adapter and rebooting. That didn't fix the problem. Tried an HP driver for my fn-F12 airplane key. No dice.

wireless.png

kyrathaba

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Re: Laptop stuck in "Airplane" mode
« Reply #1 on: September 06, 2016, 05:59 PM »
I updated the BIOS. No help though.

IainB

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Re: Laptop stuck in "Airplane" mode
« Reply #2 on: September 07, 2016, 12:46 AM »
Interesting problem.
Nice laptop - I have the smaller Pavilion-15, but it's an Intel-based system, not an AMD-based system, so is probably not the same thing.
However, I have had some peculiar transient keyboard issues that I don't quite understand, though so far nothing such as you describe.
Though I have not had any problems with the Airplane Mode switching per se, I wondered whether what you are experiencing might not in fact be a physical keyboard problem. Do you think you have eliminated that possibility?
Do you always (repeatedly) get the same results when pressing the physical AM key as you do when clicking the software on-screen "buttons"?

One suggestion that comes to mind is an experiment: find out what the Autohotkey code is for pressing the the physical AM key, and try sending that as output, to see what happens to the wifi state. It's a toggle switch (on/off/on etc.), so presumably alternate sends should reflect the toggling. But if no toggling happens then it could be a keyboard jam or a keyboard controller (hardware) problem that is defeating/blocking the software toggle. I don't see how the software toggle itself could get stuck, especially if you have checked/reinstalled the associated drivers etc. to eliminate the potential of it being a software issue.

Out of interest I did a duckgo search:
https://duckduckgo.c..._one=form&ia=web

These seemed potentially relevant, but I am not sure whether they might be of any use. Still, one never knows:
http://www.howto-con...ssues-in-windows-10/
https://www.cnet.com...ck-in-airplane-mode/
https://answers.micr...-588d39e8499d?auth=1
https://answers.micr...-7c7dac47d69a?page=2

Also, if your laptop is still under warranty, you could try an online chat via HP Support Assistant. They are quite responsive. I was using that online chat about a week ago, discussing an obscure and seemingly innocuous error (reported by HD Sentinel) that had occurred on my laptop's 1GB HDD:
     2016-06-06 22:43:45,S.M.A.R.T. 187 (Reported Uncorrectable Errors): 0 -> 1 : Attribute changed

The HDD checks out fine otherwise - 100% Health and Performance. However, backblaze statistics indicate this error to be correlated 100% with eventual total disk failure over varying periods of time, so backblaze just throw those disks out when that error occurs, without waiting for failure. It's a statistically predictable failure.

Of course, the support guys (based in India in this case), though trying to be helpful, couldn't help me as they have no authority to divert from HP policy, which dictates that, regardless of such statistical probability, HP liability only extends to a drive that has failed within the warranty period, so I shall just dump it anyway at my own expense and before the warranty expires.   :(
If you do have an online chat with them, be careful to capture the text before they sign off, because the chat seems to be abruptly expunged at that point and you cannot recover it (well, I couldn't anyway). You may need a record. Anticipating this, I managed to capture my entire chat with them so I do have a record.

kyrathaba

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Re: Laptop stuck in "Airplane" mode
« Reply #3 on: September 07, 2016, 06:41 AM »
Do you always (repeatedly) get the same results when pressing the physical AM key as you do when clicking the software on-screen "buttons"?

Yes, it's consistent.

Thanks for doing those searches. I'll follow up on them.

Yes, it is a nice laptop. Quad-core and runs up to 2.8 GHz.