How do I resolve error 651 on a new Windows 8 installation?

I spent four hours trying to resolve this problem with windows 8 and a BrightBox router courtesy of EE.

In the end,for me it was suprisingly easy to solve - in the help pages for the said router it says to have caution about using TKIP encrytion with 802.11(N) and when I changed to WPA2 and AES encryption then entered all the passwords afresh everything started to work both on windows 8 machines and on those running Windows XP.Hope this is of some use and of course some people may have to change a card or dongle to be able to use (N) if you see what I mean.

I was able to solve my problem more easily than most it appears.  I discovered that my Wi-Fi connection mysteriously reset itself in the "off" position.  I reset it to "on" and rebooted, and, lo and behold, my Internet connection was restored.  Since I never had opened that settings window after completing the initial set-up of my new laptop, I have no idea how the problem arose.

Hi Mike,

I also had same issue on my new windows 8 installation. I have followed below blog which helped me to fix issue and able to connect to internet now. Hope this will help you to solve your issue as well.  Good Luck !!!

http://www.australia-bestmate.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/windows-8-error-651.html

Cheers

Microsoft can add me to the list of unhappy users experiencing an error 651 disaster on a new Windows 8 laptop (Dell XPS L521X).  Fortunately I have a spare laptop I can use to leave this message, but after going through wasted hours doing every item on the checklist provided in this thread to get the new laptop connected wirelessly, I only have a very expensive piece of metal and glass that's attractive to look at but not worth much else.  The suggestions given by Microsoft's rep seem to me nothing more than robotic responses rather than a sincere personal effort to fix things the way they should be.

So it now comes down to this Catch-22:  How do I download a driver that may repair the problem if I can't connect to the Internet?

I also have this problem.  I have spent dozens of hours over 6 days researching Google and Bing and have found hundreds of posts ALL saying they have not found a fix. Some with very detailed processes recorded and many with a number of persons helping back and forth. A significant number with obvious technical knowledge.

There is no connection to virus or security programs or firewalls on or off or brand name or location or router type/brand/description etc. The ONLY common denominator is Windows and the desire to connect to internet; the vast majority are trying to use wireless. The most odd thing that keeps coming up is that even after a clean install; some even used a new hdd, this problem will still come back?????

It seems that once you get this problem, it won't go away. 

In LITERALLY 100% of the posts that I have read NO ONE has had this problem resolved for more than a few days. It either comes back and totally kills the connection or it brings in a different error and kills it or the connection is so erratic and unreliable it frustrates the user to no end.

I can't believe Microsoft hasn't fixed this yet.  I'm so not totally surprised!