Intel® Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260 cannot see 802.11ax (Wi-Fiv6) hotspot

[Rangoox2]

Hi guys,

My internet provider has given me a router which runs at 802.11ax but my laptop doesn't find the network. My laptop uses a wireless adapter of the model mentioned in the title - Intel® Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260.
The version of the model is 18.33.5.1 since 10/9/2016.

I saw a presentation from Intel saying that the driver 18.33.13.4 is supposed to fix it.

I saw a few similar questions circulating around but those drivers are never published so this is my last resort to recover my internet access at home. My Internet provider already lost money because they thought the issue was in their router, which is why they sent me a second one.

Could please a good-hearted person share with me that driver or if you know a better one which may still be compatible with my wireless adapter?

Kind regards,
Konstantin

[Rangoox2]

I am going to reply to myself now :D.

Firstly, I wanna say thanks to Mr Scott Pearson and of course myself for finding the relevant page because after 4 days of "agony" I finally managed to connect to my internet. Without it my laptop was just a box of locked potential. Again, second time, thanks to the posts of the gentleman mentioned.

For anyone banging his head against the wall with the same issue, you can find help here, if you go to the original post with the link:
https://community.intel.com/t5/Wireless/Intel-Dual-Band-wireless-ac-7260-drivers/m-p/1498076#M48357

I am sure that with some reading you will manage to find the solution to your problem there.

Next, for Intel, I have some constructive criticism, regarding their policy for drivers. It is a completely wrong policy, business decision if you will, on that front. The fact on the table is that many people still need that driver. Legacy drivers are produced by a manufacturer and should be distributed by that same manufacturer. Otherwise, the manufacturer takes decisions on the behalf of users for when to force them to buy a new device because the old one suddenly shuts down even though it is technically in a good shape.

To add to that, the user support service in that regard is also completely useless because they point people like me to other manufacturers, such as the one who built my laptop. If you fast-forward, you don't even need to try following the advice because our manufacturer will most likely tell us to contact the manufacturer of the corresponding component - in this case wi-fi adapter - Intel. So we go back here.
This is not an issue of the person carrying out user support in Intel, this is an issue of the limitations imposed on the people who provide those services. They could perfectly well for instance distribute drivers. Just give me the link. Let me agree with the risks, that it is old piece of software, etc...
One more point about user support. It shouldn't create a situation in which the most favorable solution for a customer of getting drivers to be a 3rd party because if Intel cannot supply its customers the right tools where else can they look for? If the choice before the customer becomes to burn $1000+ to replace a fully working machine with new one or to find drivers from dodgy sources. Clearly dodgy sources is bad.

I want to point out that actually I am a person with good level of understanding in computing and I absolutely don't see how with respect the average elderly person could sort out an the issue like that on their own. Because for anyone to do so, they should be able to themselves find out that the issue is exactly in the driver. Diagnosing the issue was half the solution and it definitely wasn't self-evident. It is far from straight forward. My internet provider, actually lost money because they were thinking that the issue is a defect in their router, so they sent me a new one - the router as a product is an expense, the logistics of delivering it, too. We have spent hours doing all sorts of settings to the routers and to my network adapter, them, me...

Lastly, what happens if Mr Pearson did no decide or was not allowed (depending on how that works) to help people by providing them that key piece of software? Everyone with a similar problem depends on him. Rhetoric question, 300+ customers of yours get entirely cut out of using they otherwise probably perfectly good machines due to poor decision making. There is no estimate of how many people fail to resolve the issue themselves or how many reach to buying external devices...

To be objective, at the end of the day yes, user support directed me here, yes I got my driver from Intel, yes my machine works, yes I am finally (very) happy. But, my internet provider lost money, I lost time, and Mr Pearson (again many thanks) has been absolutely overloaded with helping people in a similar situation and your user support probably are not over the moon by the fact that they cannot provide provide people with direct solutions.

I understand that what I am writing absolutely doesn't mater but I want to thank the gentleman again, the user guy for directing me to Intel Community, too. If anything changes for the good, super. That's exactly my point and exactly why I took the time to write this piece of feedback.
Overall, it is either a not well a though through process or a complete failure in decision making if it was.

I hope this response helps others, too.

Kind regards,
Me

[Jocelyn_Intel]

Hello, @Rangoox2  

Thank you for posting on the Intel® communities. 

Your comment is really important to us and has been addressed to the proper team for visibility, we really appreciate your feedback on this matter. 

Since you have no inquiries, this thread will no longer be monitored, but if you need further assistance, feel free to contact us back and submit a new post. 

Best regards,  

Jocelyn M.   

Intel Customer Support Technician.