Any ideas on how to “find” a driver without device manager?

klepp0906 said:

So without much foresight, I went on a rampage trying to fix my Bluetooth toggle being gone.

My adapter would only show under device manager if I was showing hidden devices.

I removed the adapter without removing the driver thinking a restart would replace it.

I was wrong. Now I have no Bluetooth adapter in device manager, and no way to remove the driver (that I know of)

I’m not sure if it was a recent windows update, or perhaps a driver install that borked it, but no idea how to continue my process of elimination at this point.

As you can imagine - exceptionally frustrating wasting time on this sort of thing

@klepp0906

Give this a shot. Lots of members use it to manage old driver deletions, and it's safe.

DriverStoreExplorer [RAPR] - Page 4 - Windows 10 Forums

Gives a display that looks like this, and allows for removal.

klepp0906 said:

Thanks for that! I’ll take a look and pray.

I just pulled a little USB adapter from my laptop and stuffed it in to test and it’s certainly the driver as the portable Bluetooth adapter showed up as generic and gave me my toggle just fine.

Will let ya know how it goes. Thanks again

You're welcome!

klepp0906 said:

well, nothing ventured nothing gained they say.

and i did gain something. another app that will undoubtedly see plenty of use over the years :)

however - im still left with "confirm that bluetooth is enabled on your system. plugin your device and click ok" when trying to install a driver.

Sorry that didn't help to totally clear up your BT issue, but yes, that app is a keeper.

klepp0906 said:

sometimes we get lucky - sometimes not so much. trying to figure out the next plan of attack with it.

its an integrated realtek adapter wifi/bluetooth thats part of the mobo. just in case some random techie got into my house and played in my bios - i checked, and as i left it - both onboard wifi and bluetooth are enabled.

Its seeing the wifi, not the bluetooth whatsoever.

argh.

Wild thought..... pop the CMOS battery and reset the BIOS back to factory. Might joggle it to see the BT. Not familiar with your MB, but it's integrated like that, might work. (get your settings first.......)

klepp0906 said:

with some quick googling, it seems to be a fairly common problem - at least with asus boards. Good ole maximus x formula completely plumbed in with watercooling etc (so RMA is not an option) and im not convinced the hardware is bad persay anyhow.

I have reset the cmos via button. also unplugged the pc overnight from the wall. Also tried optimized defaults and a fresh windows install.

nothing is bringing it back. yet the wireless adapter that shares the same chip is fine. Something is causing it to not see the bluetooth on the board. A lot of people said jostling the power has brought it back, not for me

the struggle continues >.<

ty for the reply :)

I have heard that the Reset button isn't quite an all the way reset of the BIOS back to factory. Some things, like time do not reset. Just what I have heard. If you're up to it, pop the CMOS battery, drain, and re-seat it. Worse that can happen is it won't help.