Couple issues with Lenovo E530 after upgrade

[topperdude]

Hello,

I am posting this for a neighbor / friend who owns the Lenovo E530. They are an older / retired couple that uses this laptop sparingly.
I am a software engineer and help them out with computer related things as much as possible.
Recently, I swapped the old / original spinning 5400rpm hard drive that came with the laptop with a Western Digital Blue SSD.
As expected, this boosted the performance of the laptop that it was acceptable for how much they use it.

It also appeared that although the laptop was updated to Windows 10 by some technician in their home state before they moved to our area, the drivers, BIOS etc. were outdated. For example, the BIOS was the original one and many of the other drivers were from between 2011 or so.
I went to the official Lenovo website and downloaded the most recent drivers for the hardware components in their E530.
I also found the most recent BIOS on the website and updated it using the BIOS update utility on the Lenovo website.

The issues:
1. This laptop has the RTL8188CE Wi-Fi card. Even though I have updated this laptop with the most recent driver from Lenovo's website, they are having issues seeing and connecting to their Wi-Fi as I have detailed over here. I am not sure why the laptop can see and connect to my Eero Wi-Fi network but not to their Eero Wi-Fi network. All other devices in their house (including some 2.4Ghz only switches) connect to their Eero Wifi network without issues.
2. Before updating the BIOS, when the laptop would be powered on, it would show the Thinkvantage splash screen and boot as normal. However, after updating it with the latest BIOS on Lenovo's website linked above, when we power on the laptop, the tiny red LED in the "i" of Thinkpad turns on and I can hear the fans spin and CD drive seeking. However, the screen remain blank. The laptop then needs to be turned off after ~15 seconds by keeping the power button pressed till the red LED in the "i" of Thinkpad turns off. And immediately press the power button once it turns off and then the laptop boots up as normal. I am not sure what causes this behavior but would appreciate any input to help fix it.

Thanks very much in advance for any feedback / help that can help resolve either or both of these issues.
-Topper

[RealBlackStuff]

Welcome to the Forum.
That RTL8188CE wifi card is 1x1 and should be thrown away!
Replace with a Broadcom 2x2 BCM943228HMB (FRU 04W3835).

Maybe the laptop needs to be fully exited first from W10 to restart properly?

[topperdude]

Welcome to the Forum.
That RTL8188CE wifi card is 1x1 and should be thrown away!
Replace with a Broadcom 2x2 BCM943228HMB (FRU 04W3835).

Maybe the laptop needs to be fully exited first from W10 to restart properly?

Thank you for the quick reply. My initial thought was also to replace the Realtek card but I only had an Intel 7260 WiFi card on hand and since these laptops tend to have whitelist, I did not want to take a chance and mess anything up further with the laptop.

After my initial post above, I went back to the Lenovo support page and came across this document. On page 13 through 15, they list the Intel 2250 + BT card as the one included with the E530 3259 that my neighbors have. Would this WiFi card be a better bet to try compared to the Broadcom especially since Intel's specifications list it as a 2x2 card as well?

Someone on the Lenovo forums also pointed to the E530 Parts List document which lists the Intel 6250 to avoid whitelist issues (even though the drivers for the 6250 are not listed on Lenovo support page for E530).

So I am hoping to recommend them to get one card from ebay instead of going back/forth with trial and error.

Thank you so much in advance for any further assistance,
-Topper

[RealBlackStuff]

The N-2230 is indeed listed for E530 as 'Jackson Peak 1' (FRU 04W3765).
Should do the same as the BCM I recommended.
And E530 does have a wifi-whitelist in BIOS.
My wife had an E530 for a few years, mostly for web browsing, email and some light gaming.
I sold it on to a family member whose 10-years old daughter uses it for school now.
It came with an i3-2350M CPU, which I replaced with an i5-3340M which has better graphics (HD3000 --> HD4000).