[MacTUG] MacBook reporting "Wifi no hardware installed"

[Glenn Anderson]

I don’t know if anyone has encountered this or not, but I have a older MacBook reporting that there is no wifi hardware installed. As all MacBooks come with wi-fi this is somewhat of a strange message. It might be more meaningful for the system to report a hardware failure with the wifi card/hardware than to report it isn’t installed. However I guess their is always the chance that the connection to the hardware has failed and thus it doesn’t show up.

There are several suggestion to how to resolve this, such below:

What do I do when my Mac says WI FI no hardware installed?
Reset the PRAM or NVRAM
        • Turn your Mac off. Then hold down Command ⌘ + Option + P + R keys together.
        • Hold down Command ⌘ + Option + P + R together.
        • Keep holding these four keys down while you turn on the Mac again. Release them all together only after you hear the Mac reboot sound again.

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These however didn’t work, which likely indicates some hardware failure of the wifi or the cable.

As this is an older Mac no longer serviced by Apple, that rules out getting it serviced by Apple, as would the cost as it is likely more than what the unit is worth for Apple to service it.

If the card is dead, one can buy a replacement on Amazon for around $60 ( with shipping ) + taxes, but then there is still the issue of replacing the old card and who to get to do it.

As to the solution...

In this case the solution was to buy an USB wi-fi dongle for $20 ( including taxes/shipping ) and plug it in. This worked perfectly with the OS X recognizing it and using it. Apparently it works better/faster than the build in wi-fi card which is a bit of a bonus.

The one catch is to make sure the dongle is Apple compatible and to read the reviews to make sure it is. Also it is important to make sure it works with the latest OS versions, or the latest version you can run on the Mac in question.

Note, I am not sure this or other such adapters work with the latest OS X versions as it seems they may not come with the necessary generic usb wi-fi support.