No Wifi after iPhone 3.1 upgrade

Sorry to hear you have just had your failure of the wifi.

my previous post detailed discharging the battery, well i did it again and it didnt work. during that same issue I had dropped the phone the day before and the sim popped out. Just wondering if anyone here has not dropped their phone EVER and had this issue?

Thanks, James

Looks like this is a major problem with 3.1.3 - my phone was fine until I upgraded - now I have the greyed out look and nothing else - if fully discharged sometimes comes back up for a few minutes but then loses it again. Tried all the resets etc so off to see apple next week - by the looks of the waiting list a few thousand others are doing the same -

Come on Apple - sort yourselves out.

I too had the same problem that a lot of people state - after the upgrade wifi was not working.
I could see and join the wifi network no problem but browsing the internet, etc. did not work.
I could turn off wifi and browse the internet via 3G no problem.
I reset the network settings but this did not work.
I released my DHCP address in the router and clicked renew on the phone and got an IP but browsing, etc. still did not work.
I set a static address in my iphone and everything works fine.

Those who are having a problem may want to try to set a static address in their iphone.

Message was edited by: myrobservation

We just had our wifi go out today on our iPhone 3Gs. It would not detect any network (not just our home network, but no network at all), but it did have a number in the wifi address spot. Our iPod touch and laptops could connect without a problem. I tried many of the tricks that people on this forum (and many other forums) recommended, but nothing worked. As a final all-or-nothing attempt, I did the following without checking for wifi access in between steps, and after all of these steps, it is now working again:

1) Disabled 3G
2) Disabled Data Roaming
3) Reset the iPhone network setting
4) Did a hard reset -> press and hold the home button and the sleep button at the same time until the phone shuts off (ignore the "Shutdown?" screen that shows up during this process... after a few more seconds of button holding it will do a forced shutdown)
5) Reset our home wifi router
6) Waited 3 minutes, then powered back on the phone
7) Re-enabled 3G and Data Roaming
8) Reset the network setting once again
9) Checked for wifi, and all was well again.

So, there you have it! If nothing else has worked for you, it may be worth doing this all-or-nothing approach. I have no idea which step in the process made it work, but since it works now, I don't actually care. If it doesn't work, you've only lost 5 minutes of your time. If it does work, you're phone is awesome again.

Good luck!

Modern cars have Central Control Modules that do need updates from time to time... But those updates require the owner to take the car in for updates. In other words the owner is not expected to perform this task at home. But Apple's updates are AUTOMATED so that users/owners are suppose to be able perform this simple task themselves... and during process, which is reasonable because it requires just a few clicks on the mouse, and the end result is the firmware burn process by Apple is defective that it fries the wifi, the owner
/user has no liability since the process that Apple has in place for reasonable user update causes this failure because of prexisting faulty components, THEY ARE LIABLE. All because the update process does not allow users any way of corrupting or destroying the faulty components. All this is to say, I got a new phone yesterday 6 months past my warranty.

Thanks Caligulan,
I thought that the steps you suggested made sense, so I tried them once, twice and three times with small variations each time but nothing worked. I guess you have been lucky with your iPhone.
After reading and trying most of the suggestions that made sense in this forum, it does not work (I even tried some suggestions during full moon!!!).
I am surprised that the first entry regarding this problem has been entered for the first time in September 2009 and since then; Apple did not find a solution? My wireless network works with everything wireless like my printer, 2 laptops, except my iPhone. Fortunately, the main function of my iPhone works, but I can’t see myself with a similar problem with an iPad, where networking is the heart of that device.
If I succeed to return my phone for this problem, it will be the second time that I request the replacement of my iPhone for the same problem. Like we say in French, “c’est à suivre...”

Another wi-fi free phone here. My husband pointed out that my 3G usage had quadrupled over the past few months and I realized my wi-fi went out awhile ago and I haven't had a chance to troubleshoot. After researching a bit, took the phone to the Genius Bar where the genius helpfully told me that, yup, my wi-fi was fried but GOOD NEWS!, a new phone is due out in a month. Really? I buy a premium product, it last for a bit over a year, and then I get to buy ANOTHER premium product! Good timing!

I think AT&T should be made aware that all those wi-fi free people out there are now THEIR burden. If my use quadrupled, a lot of people's did after failure due to firmware upgrade or hardware failure.

Very frustrating.

I tried to sort out a course of action from all the various posts and determined the first thing I needed to do was to restore my iPhone (1st generation). When I did I moved from "cannot scan for Wi-Fi" to the grayed-out "No Wi-Fi" under "Settings" that others were talking about. Now what? Does Apple have a fix for this glitch?

I love my iPhone, but having tried all the solutions on this thread several times, having upgraded to 3.1.3, I think the best solution is to place the iPhone on the ground, and drive back and forwards over it until it's dead..!!
Is this a ploy by Apple to get everyone to change their phone for the new 4G one which is due very soon?
Has Apple even recognised that this is a problem or is it all being swept under the proverbial carpet?

As I pointed out in another thread regarding these WiFi-issues, I am sure now that these problems are completely software related:

My iphones WiFi started working again after installing the iOS4 GoldenMaster. It worked flawlessly and up to today, transferring nearly 1GB of data in the past days.

Because I travel a lot and only have a PC Notebook, I synced my iPhone today with a PC running the final release of iTunes 9.2. After syncing to this "new" library (music and apps got deleted as usual) WiFi stopped working immediately with the same failure as before (failure connecting blabla).

I will try to restore it to the iOS4 GM on my Mac when I return home. I will post any result here.

I have a brand new 3g that is doing this I have had it for 2 days. I'm happy I have an android for my personal phone. But anyways, I have tried reformatting it to 3.1.3 and that didn't help tried several of the things in this thread but sadly nothing is working. But I have another 3g that has never had this problem. I think I'm going to try. Os 4 later but I saw that someone tired that and it worked then stopped working. Also the nearest apple store for me is an hours and a half drive away. Should I take it back or just hope its a software thing.

This actually worked. I modified it a little:

1) Disabled 3G
2) Disabled Data Roaming
3) Reset the iPhone network setting
4) Did a hard reset -> press and hold the home button and the sleep button at the same time until the phone shuts off (ignore the "Shutdown?" screen that shows up during this process... after a few more seconds of button holding it will do a forced shutdown)
5) Power the phone back on
6) Re-enabled 3G and Data Roaming

This worked beautifully, thank you

Some cases are a physical failure.
I fixed mine - this may help others.
http://www.yestertech.net

"My iphones WiFi started working again after installing the iOS4 GoldenMaster. It worked flawlessly and up to today, transferring nearly 1GB of data in the past days."

iOS4 does not fix the issue. I just joined this club after installing it. It seems like you must have gotten lucky. From all the reading I've done it seems to be caused by the firmware update burning out the wifi chip.

It's more than curious that I lost my WiFi during a firmware-update and got it back with a firmware update 6 months later.

In the time between the update to 3.1.2 which broke my wifi and the update to 4 GM I often tried to connect to different routers. I had absolutely no success whatever I tried; resetting, setting up as new device, ... - also the "freezer trick" didn't help at all.

I'm not disagreeing that it is indeed a hardware issue, but my phone never dropped on the floor, never got handled rough, was never jailbroken or altered in any way (up to the point where I began trying everything to get wifi back to work), I never used any protective sleeve that could raise temperature in the phone nore do I live in a climate that is hot or rather damp.
So, what should I think when my wifi stops working right after upgrading to 3.1.2 and immediately starts working again after upgrading to 4 GM?

IF this problem is related to a sensor and the temp inside the phone, then it should have been possible for Apple to alter the temp-sensors characteristics to get the problem under control.