r/toughbook • u/mjdeiter • Jul 28 '25

TechSupport Panasonic Toughbook MK4 CF-19 Wifi will only work after bootup if you toggle wifi switch.

My Wi-Fi card (an Intel AX210) isn't staying enabled after boot — I have to manually toggle the hardware switch every time I boot up my laptop. I think it's possible the wireless interface doesn't initialize properly due to power management or driver timing issues. I've heard of that happening with Intel cards in older laptops running Linux.

To fix it, I tried several steps:

I checked and disabled any soft or hard blocks from rfkill

I added wifi.powersave=2 to my GRUB boot parameters to turn off Wi-Fi power saving

I created a systemd service that runs rfkill unblock wifi at startup

I made sure the iwlwifi driver was loading correctly and without errors

Despite all of this, the issue still persists. At this point, I believe it's related to a firmware or BIOS-level behavior that doesn't have a reliable software workaround. Before I give up, I wanted to just check with you all first to see if you had any suggestions.

Hardware info:

Model: MK4 CF-19 RDREX1M

CPU: Intel Core i5-540U @ 1.20 GHz (2 cores, 4 threads)

Architecture: Arrandale (32nm, 2010), 1st Gen Core

RAM: 8 GB DDR3 800 MHz (2×4 GB SODIMMs)

Wi-Fi/Bluetooth: Intel AX210 (Wi-Fi 6E / BT 5.3) – PCIe or USB

OS: Manjaro Linux (Kernel 6.12.39-1-MANJARO)

MK4 CF-19 Wifi will only work after bootup if you toggle wifi switch.

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2

u/Hunter5117 17d ago

Just a thanks for your post, sorry I can not help your issue but you helped me solve mine.

After doing a CMOS battery/bios reset on my CF-54 to fix my battery charging problem, my bluetooth stopped working. Looking through this group I saw your post and it reminded me about the wireless on/off switch. Sure enough, while taking the case apart to access the CMOS battery I must have switched the switch. Easy fix.

PS for some reason the switch did not affect wifi. Not sure why. TIA.

1

u/mjdeiter 17d ago

Yeah I just learned to live with it. It’s an odd issue for sure. Doesn’t seem to matter if I boot up to Windows or Linux either. Does the same thing. Glad you were able to fix your issue though :)

1

u/JustSomeone202020 Jul 28 '25

any options in the bios that have that wake on boot option enabled? What happens if you completely remove the card to begin with?

1

u/mjdeiter Jul 31 '25

Nothing really in BIOS that stands out. I’ve tried different cards, a 7260 and 8265 (with adaptor) and I get the same results.

1

u/JustSomeone202020 Aug 01 '25

perhaps some short then?

1

u/mjdeiter 26d ago

Nah I don’t think that’s it because it doesn’t do it with the original card , only the AX210 I put in it. Actually anything but the original because I tried multiple cards like an AC7260 and 8265NGW.