Bluetooth on PC just suddenly vanished

Drez

Long story short, the motherboard I have is the Asus Rog Maximus XI Hero (Wifi). It has onboard Bluetooth, which I have used for years.

Yesterday, I was playing Soul Hackers 2 on Steam and literally while I was playing, my 8bitdo (SN80 Pro 2) controller disconnected. I saved the game via mouse and went to bed.

Today, absolutely nothing I tried worked. I tried messing with the controller but after digging more, it looks like my PC is no longer recognizing itself as Bluetooth capable via that onboard radio or whatever. I tried installing new bluetooth drivers from Intel, new bluetooth drivers from Asus, checked that it was enabled in BIOS (it's the same setting for onboard wifi and bluetooth and it was enabled), rebooted numerous times, etc. Nothing.

Wifi still works. It uses the same "antenna" (with two connections into the back of the PC/motherboard).

Any thoughts?

Gilgaron

Did you try some other bluetooth device like a headset to be sure it isn't the controller that died?

Naphtali

is bluetooth even visible in device manager (check for show hidden devices under View if not)

Drez

No, it’s gone.

Naphtali

is it enabled in Windows settings (Start->Settings->Devices->Bluetooth & others, and then "On" is checked)

Drez

Naphtali wrote: »

is it enabled in Windows settings (Start->Settings->Devices->Bluetooth & others, and then "On" is checked)

So that option doesn't even exist anymore. There's no Bluetooth On/Off, it's just not there. Somehow, my onboard Bluetooth radio itself either blew out or all of a sudden became undetectable to Windows 11.

I don't have the patience/energy/whatever to reinstall Windows or anything, and I'm extremely impatient, so I bought this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B2W2LXZN?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

And it worked fine. I'm back in business. I've effectively sacrificed a USB 3.0 slot to that Bluetooth radio, but that's OK.

Drez

Just to be clear, the Bluetooth On/Off option came back when I plugged the USB Bluetooth radio in.

deathnote666

Did you try safe mode?

Hold the shift key and click restart. Choose to reboot with advanced options and then choose safe mode with network connections.

Drez

deathnote666 wrote: »

Did you try safe mode?

Hold the shift key and click restart. Choose to reboot with advanced options and then choose safe mode with network connections.

I didn't. I'll try that this weekend

Drez

Maybe plugging in the new USB Bluetooth adapter/radio will impel the old one to start working again, out of jealousy.