Problems with WiFi and Sleep Mode on Windows 11

I first updated to Windows 11 on my Dell Inspiron 14" 5405 laptop the day after launch day (I know, I know, I probably should have waited but it was working properly on my friends' laptops and PCs so I couldn't resist). It was working fine, until the day after. When I came back, it had turned off (I'm not sure why, maybe it hibernated because I left it too long) so I tried to turn it on, but it blue screened. This is where the problems began. My WiFi adapter (Qualcomm QCA61x4A 802.11ac Wireless Adapter) stopped working (no WiFi networks showed up and the adapter just deleted itself from Device Manager) and my laptop doesn't have Ethernet so I had no internet access. Thankfully, after freaking out and downgrading back to Windows 10, it fixed itself. But now every time the laptop slept, even in Windows 10, it would randomly turn off (this would close all my programs as well, so it didn't just hibernate) and I had the same problem. Shutting down and turning the laptop on again (not restarting) fixed the problem again, but I didn't want to keep doing this. In Control Panel (Hardware and Sound > Power Options > Choose or customise a power plan), I found out that it was hibernating by itself, so I turned this off, and things were good... until I updated to Windows 11 a few weeks after as it seemed much more stable. I still had the same problem, but now the option to turn off auto-hibernation was gone, as you can see in this image:



Therefore, I had to turn off auto-sleeping. It fixed the problem but now whenever my laptop was closed or left alone, the battery drained so much to the point where, unless I'm leaving my laptop for maybe a few minutes, I had to charge it so it wouldn't run out or just shut it down. I just did this for a few months until earlier this week, I just reset the laptop after having problems with my mic. The first few times I put the laptop to sleep, it stayed in sleep mode and did not shut down or hibernate, until last night, where after I left it for about an hour, it turned off and the WiFi stopped working once again. Since then, it sometimes sleeps normally without turning off, and sometimes turns off and the wifi stops working.

This is really getting on my nerves and I am really stuck on how to fix it, as not even a reset has fixed it. Does anyone know how to fix it - or could it be a hardware issue? Thanks :)

Welcome to the forum.
If you have Dell Support Assist on your laptop run it to get all the latest drivers. There are a ton of drivers updated within the last year, many urgent.

If you do not have Support Assist
Go here Support for Inspiron 5405 | Drivers & Downloads | Dell US
Apply the recent urgent updates... Chipset, wifi, bluetooth, graphics ( make sure you are running the latest bios listed there.)


Once all drivers are updated open an administrative command prompt and type powercfg -a Furnish a screenshot of the results.

glasskuter said:

Welcome to the forum.
If you have Dell Support Assist on your laptop run it to get all the latest drivers. There are a ton of drivers updated within the last year, many urgent.

If you do not have Support Assist
Go here Support for Inspiron 5405 | Drivers & Downloads | Dell US
Apply the recent urgent updates... Chipset, wifi, bluetooth, graphics ( make sure you are running the latest bios listed there.)


Once all drivers are updated open an administrative command prompt and type powercfg -a Furnish a screenshot of the results.

Click to expand...

Dell are months behind with graphic drivers through Support Assist

glasskuter said:

Welcome to the forum.
If you have Dell Support Assist on your laptop run it to get all the latest drivers. There are a ton of drivers updated within the last year, many urgent.

If you do not have Support Assist
Go here Support for Inspiron 5405 | Drivers & Downloads | Dell US
Apply the recent urgent updates... Chipset, wifi, bluetooth, graphics ( make sure you are running the latest bios listed there.)

Once all drivers are updated open an administrative command prompt and type powercfg -a Furnish a screenshot of on my lthe results.

Click to expand...

I have support assist on my laptop, and it had no updates, and I'm pretty sure I already have the latest versions of the drivers on the website.

I ran powercfg -a and this is what it said:



(thanks for the quick response by the way)

powercfg.exe /sleepstudy

The ugly modern sleep bites again. S0 state systems support a low-power idle state known as Modern Standby. In this state, the system can very quickly switch from a low-power state to high-power state, so that it can respond quickly to hardware and network events. Systems that support Modern Standby do not use S1-S3. This forum has many reports of the issues caused by modern standby, mostly battery drain and excessive heat when inside a case..

To re-enable hibernation open cmd as administrator and type powercfg.exe /hibernate on

abactuon said:

Modern standby SleepStudy

The SleepStudy tool provides overview information about each modern standby session.

docs.microsoft.com

powercfg.exe /sleepstudy

Click to expand...

I've done this and it looks like here is an example of the problem:



I've attached the full report below.

It certainly will affect your battery drain more but you can stop the wifi from turning off.

1. Right-click on the Start Menu and choose Device Manager.
2. Expand the list below Network Adapters.
3. Right-click on your network adapter.
4. Select Properties.
5. Click on the Power Management tab.
6. Uncheck the box next to Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power.

I don't know what else to tell you other than shutting it off or always using it plugged in.

glasskuter said:

It certainly will affect your battery drain more but you can stop the wifi from turning off.

1. Right-click on the Start Menu and choose Device Manager.
2. Expand the list below Network Adapters.
3. Right-click on your network adapter.
4. Select Properties.
5. Click on the Power Management tab.
6. Uncheck the box next to Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power.

Click to expand...

I can't find the Power Management tab...

glasskuter said:

The ugly modern sleep bites again. S0 state systems support a low-power idle state known as Modern Standby. In this state, the system can very quickly switch from a low-power state to high-power state, so that it can respond quickly to hardware and network events. Systems that support Modern Standby do not use S1-S3. This forum has many reports of the issues caused by modern standby, mostly battery drain and excessive heat when inside a case..

To re-enable hibernation open cmd as administrator and type powercfg.exe /hibernate on

Click to expand...

Oh ok, well that's annoying. I think hibernation was already on but I ran powercfg.exe /hibernate on anyway. Maybe that'll help?

Then try this. Control panel-power options-'change plan settings' beside your power plan-change advanced power settings-expand wireless adapter settings-see if it will let you change it to maximum performance. I do not own a device that uses modern standby so can't be sure what options you will see.

Like I said, I don't know what else to tell you other than shutting it off or always using it plugged in. Hopefully someone else has more suggestions.

You know hibernate is on by going to power options in control panel-under choose what the power buttons do. With hibernate on, fast startup is added to the options.

glasskuter said:

..... I don't know what else to tell you other than shutting it off or always using it plugged in.

Click to expand...

That's what I've gone to. It's keeps killing my brand new battery!

snerd said:

That's what I've gone to. It's keeps killing my brand new battery!

Click to expand...

Yes. Likewise.

There are in effect four Power/Computer states for an S0 Modern standby [aka S0 Low power idle] computer
- Computer on, Monitor on
- Computer on, Monitor off {The monitor turning off initiates S0 Modern standby, the progressively severe idle condition that suppresses, amongst other things, Task scheduler tasks}.
- Hibernate
- Off

There is no "Sleep" in the sense that we commonly use the term ["S3 Sleep"].
- This is despite MS leaving the word Sleep dotted around the place such as in the descriptions of the later phases of S0 Modern standby [S0 is progressive. It will increasingly reduce the permitted activities as time passes.].

Or set your monitor timeout to Never in Power options and avoid S0 ever kicking in.
I've been trying to get the best of both worlds by setting my monitor timeout to never but having a fairly dark-screened screensaver licking in at 2 mins.

And you can see records of the transitions between states in Event viewer -
Event viewer, Custom view, Power - Sleep-Hibernate-S0 transitions [post #40] - TenForums
This works in S0 computers & in proper computers.

If you want to see Event viewer records of On/Off then read
My ditty - Event viewer - Start-Shutdown Custom views [post #2] - TenForums

All the best,
Denis

snerd said:

That's what I've gone to. It's keeps killing my brand new battery!

Click to expand...

Hold on. You do not have an S0 computer.

Denis

If the hardwares are working properly, everything should work without problems at the default settings.
Do a clean install of Windows 11 or 10?
Download drivers to disk to install manually. Not necessarily from the Dell website.

abactuon said:

If the hardwares are working properly, everything should work without problems at the default settings.
Do a clean install of Windows 11 or 10?
Download drivers to disk to install manually. Not necessarily from the Dell website.

Click to expand...

I don't know what your situation is so cannot answer. I suggest you create a thread of your own.

But, about drivers -
For the major hardware components that were in my computer when I bought it, I get updated drivers & Bios from the computer maker.
Windows update supplies many of the drivers for other components including Intel ones.
Whenever I get additional hardware, I check for drivers from its maker and accept MS drivers for the rest.

All the best,
Denis

I wonder what causes the condition 'Abnormal shutdown', for example, for me to 'Screen off':

If you are experiencing an abnormal shutdown at the time that the monitor turns off then I'd suggest reinstalling your display driver..
But you did not mention it in your earlier post and I find that puzzling.

If the problem persists then I still suggest starting a thread of your own.

Best of luck,
Denis

glasskuter said:

Then try this. Control panel-power options-'change plan settings' beside your power plan-change advanced power settings-expand wireless adapter settings-see if it will let you change it to maximum performance. I do not own a device that uses modern standby so can't be sure what options you will see.

Like I said, I don't know what else to tell you other than shutting it off or always using it plugged in. Hopefully someone else has more suggestions.

Click to expand...

Again there's no option for this annoyingly. I think it might have been there in Windows 10, but Windows 11 removed a bunch of options from that page for some reason. Therefore, I've just gone back to what I was doing before: turning off auto-sleeping. I think I need to get my laptop checked because it looks like it might be a hardware problem with the WiFI card or something.