Surface Pro 3 - Windows 10 - WiFi (slow or limited connectivity )

Anonymous
2015-07-30T14:16:39+00:00

Have a Surface Pro 3 that worked fine till I updated to Win10.  Now the wireless connection seems to randomly go to a "limited connectivity" mode.  Fortunately was purchased from Costco a coupe of weeks ago so it is going back there if we can't get this figured out by Sunday.

The Surface Pro3 is a flagship device - why in the world would you subject your customers to have to resort to looking for help in forums like this?

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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Anonymous
2015-11-13T10:20:54+00:00

Everyone,

Build 10586 - the November Windows 10 update - was released yesterday, and it contains a newer Marvell wireless driver 15.68.9032.47 - people are reporting that this greatly improves wireless connectivity. Please download the large update, and if you used the registry hack, reverse it as follows:

Press Windows button. Search for regedit. Open it

  1. Navigate to the following path:

 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\mrvlpcie8897

  1. Find the item labeled “TXAMSDU”. Double tap and modify the value from 0 to 1
  2. Restart the machine

Then test your connectivity, and post results.

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Anonymous
2015-11-13T10:44:26+00:00

Fred,

the November Windows 10 update to build 10586 has new wireless drivers. Can you download and install the update (it should be offered via WU) and let us know if this changes your connectivity?

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Anonymous
2015-08-05T18:12:39+00:00

Penny,

These kinds of issues WERE present on 8.1 for months but they mostly all cleared after several driver updates.

And that particular router is not one known to exhibit slow wifi. I'm suggesting you trade it because it is SP new and you can now get one with 10 pre-installed and not have to go through an upgrade AND because you have this issue. Getting it swapped will rule out a hardware issue and would be a step forward.

This is what *I* would do if in this situation.

For what it's worth - Microsoft needs to fix the driver and any underlying Win 10 OS issues. It took them 9 months to get a "good" Windows 8.1 wireless driver. For now, consider an external USB wireless adapter. I carry around a http://www.amazon.com/Edimax-EW-7811UTC-Dual-Band-Connectivity-Exceeding/dp/B00FW6T36Y

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  1. Anonymous
    2015-09-20T22:44:39+00:00

    I like your theory but I think I can disprove it.  The problem for me isn't 5G .  The problem is AC.  I had a Dual Band 2.4 and 5G wireless N router and everything worked fine.  2 weeks ago I upgraded my router to a triband wireless AC router and since then it's been pure wireless hell since.  So, just to make sure it wasn't an issue with the router,   I bought a 2nd router, a Dual Band AC router from a different manufacturer and the results were no different.  The 2 routers were even purchased in different countries; I bought one in Canada and one in the USA and they were both awful with thee SP3 - like to the point of pretty much non functional.  Yes I could connect to the internet (intermittently) but connecting to other devices on my network was disastrous.   So, I tried two more things with both routers:

    1. I manually set the internal Marvell Network adapter to operate at 2.4G only and the problem disappeared but obviously I didn't get any of the speed advantages of AC or Even N.
    2. Next I completely disabled the internal Marvell adapter and plugged in a USB AC1200 network adapter and the Surface performed flawlessly with both routers on the AC 5G band and I got true 822mbps connection speeds.   I have 2 SP3 devices in the house and had exactly the same results with both.

    The ONLY conclusion I can reach is that the Marvell Card used by Microsoft is an absolute piece of s. ........ when it comes to compatibility with the AC Wireless standard for which it was built.  Ands I must admit I'm really not happy about it.  This is supposed to be a flagship device and it is not performing like one.  That I have to stick a dongle out of the one USB port to make it work is ridiculous.  I upgraded from a SP2 after a year and looks like I need to swap out again, Only this time I WILL NOT BUY A SP4 - I'll be going to the Lenovo Miix 700  - Shame on you Microsoft!@

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-09-20T17:31:31+00:00

    I am not sure this is the same problem, but I have my 5G Wifi issue fixed - by purchasing a new router that offer the suitable Wifi channels for local use.

    It appears that, from certain point of time (probably around the beginning of 2015), device markers are pushed (by FCC?) to lock down the channels that is not supposed to be available in that region. As a result, if you use a device (notebook/tablet/AP) imported from other regions, depending on the Wifi channels allowed, you CAN start to have problems you did not have before.

    The reason that the Surface Wifi problem only start to show with Win10 can be that Microsoft updated firmware/device driver as requested alongside with Win10 release.  Because the new drivers now block the illegit channels, configurations or APs utilizing those channels would fail. 

    This should affect 5G more but can also affect 2.4G, depending on the configurations.

    If this is indeed the issue - I am sure Microsoft can fix it, but I am not sure they can legally do so. For the time being, an updated AP, an USB Wifi dongle, or a combination of both, should do the quick fix. 

    Just my two cent. Good luck.

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