TP-Link driver is bricking my PC somehow.

 

Please bear with me.

My Archer T2U V1 adapter is not working properly as it should.
The USB hub on my front case is also acting very strange.
Right now I'm connected to the internet via USB tethering my phone.

 

The problem started every time my PC goes to sleep, when it wakes up, my Wi-Fi will stop working.

Based on my searches, this seems to be a common issue with this device.

What I initially tried to do to fix this was,

• I disabled the USB selective suspend in the Power Option and also in the TP-Link adapter properties via Device Manager.
• I unchecked "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power" option.
• I did the exact same thing with every single one of the USB controllers as well, including the hidden ones.
• I also uninstalled each one of the USB controllers devices and then restarted the PC, but again to no avail.
• I enabled "Allow network connectivity during connected-standby" option via the Group Policy (Administrative Templates > System > Power Management > Sleep Settings).
• I also checked that hibernation is already disabled for my system, as well as fast boot (Windows and BIOS).

 

But somehow the Wi-Fi still always powers down when my PC goes to sleep and it won't power back up again when the PC wakes.
I switch up the ports between my devices (the front hub has 4 ports, two USB 3.0 and two USB 2.0, connected to my BT dongle, my mouse receiver, my keyboard, alongside the Wi-Fi dongle)
But still, the problem persists, everything else works fine except the Wi-Fi dongle.
So perhaps the problem was not due to the USB ports.

My guess was that it must've had something to do with the power management of the USB device when waking up from sleep state.

 

Sometimes disabling and re-enabling the adapter via Device Manager fixes it.
Sometimes "updating" the adapter and then selecting the same driver fixes it.
When these don't work, I would have to unplug the adapter and plug it back in again.
Sometimes everything works fine but if I unplug any of the devices on that hub and plug it back in again, the device won't get detected. They won't even get powered up anymore.

When all else fails I would have to restart my PC.
Somehow every time the PC boots from restart or shut down, there's never any problem with the USB hub or with the Wi-Fi.
But if I leave my PC long enough until it goes to sleep, then the same problem persists.

 

Now this is the first part of the problem.
The second part is after I tried to completely fix this problem.

I downloaded different versions of the driver from TP-Link website and tested them out just to see if it would fix the problem.
This is when my PC gets bricked.

Now my T2U adapter is now completely unable to properly connect to any network, regardless of any version of the driver that I use.
It's either not detecting any network, or sometimes detecting only a few of the networks but still can't connect to them, or sometimes connecting to a network but the connection is dreadfully slow.

I don't think the problem is because of weak signal because I never had this problem before and I've had this USB Wi-Fi dongle for quite some time now.

5Ghz networks also stop being discovered even though "2.4Ghz + 5Ghz" mode was already selected in the adapter properties.

This time I also tried connecting the adapter directly to the mobo USB ports. Same problem.

To make matters worst, now one of my USB 2.0 port on the front hub had also stopped working and is behaving even stranger.
When I try connecting my BT dongle, or keyboard, or mouse on that port, they won't even get powered up anymore, even after shutdown/restart.

Sometimes it can detect my mouse but gives out this error instead and the mouse won't function.

 

...(code 43). A request for the usb device descriptor failed.

 

But somehow, right now I'm tethered to the Internet using my phone through this EXACT SAME port and there's no problem whatsoever.

The internet speed is also just fine.

 

https://forums.hardwarezone.com.sg/threads/tp-link-archer-t2u-ac600-suddenly-stopped-working.5434997/

 

I came across this forum post stating that reinstalling Windows solves the problem and that the TP-Link driver perhaps may have actually corrupted some system files. I also have this same suspicion because I've actually had this goddamn exact same problem at least two times already. With these exact same sequence of problems, trying these exact same attempts to fix them, and getting the exact same outcome, my PC getting bricked. In both of the times, I remember installing the TP-Link driver, and then the exact same USB 2.0 port starts to malfunction and the Wi-Fi adapter also stopped working. Then after I reinstalled Windows, everything went back to working again.

Maybe two times was not enough to convince me but having this happen yet again the third time the exact same way? Hmmm, maybe I am right.

I feel like somehow installing or reinstalling TP-Link driver seems to corrupt some system files or something, I'm not sure.

 

These are among the things that I've tried,

1. Running System File Checker

sfc /scannow

dism /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth

2. Trying all these different versions of the driver

• 00015960-RTLWlanU_WindowsDriver_1030.38.0712.2019_Drv_3.00.0032.L
• Archer T2U_EU_US_V2_180522_Win
• Archer T2U(EU_US)_V1_170724_Wins
• Archer_T2U(UN)__V1_161019
• Archer_T2U_V1_150108
• Archer_T2U_V1_Driver_140523

3. Making sure "WLAN Autoconfig" service is already running.

4. Uninstalling all USB controllers via Device Manager and restarting the PC
5. Disabling USB selective suspend and unchecking "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power" option in the Wi-Fi adapter properties via Device Manager
6. Disabling USB selective suspend via Power Option
7. Disabling fast boot via registry editor

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Power

HiberbootEnabled = 0

8. Disabling hibernation via cmd

powercfg -h off

9. Disabling fast boot via BIOS (was already disabled).

10. Resetting network via Network & Internet settings
11. Reseting network stack via cmd

netsh winsock reset 
netsh int ip reset
ipconfig /release
ipconfig /renew
ipconfig /flushdns

12. Deleting the driver package via cmd

pnputil /enum-drivers

pnputil /delete-driver oem*.inf /uninstall /force

13. Checking BIOS version
14. Checking BIOS peripherals settings

• XHCI hand-off set to enabled
• EHCI hand-off set to disabled

15. Checking and changing up the USB physical connection to the mobo

 

Sorry for the long ass post, I've been trying to fix this issue for the last 5 days, hoping that I won't have to resolve to reinstalling my PC.

By now I have at least bought 4 or 5 different TP-Link products already but this device is by far the worst that I've experienced with.

Please look into this, if it is indeed a problem with the driver.

Thanks.