For unsigned community drivers:

If you have the wrong driver, or if the driver is corrupted or outdated, you may experience:

If after trying both Ralink and MediaTek drivers the adapter still fails, the device may be defective or use a very obscure Chinese chipset (e.g., Realtek 8188). In that case, a new adapter like the (which uses the same chipset but has official drivers) is a better use of $15.

Once you have initiated the , follow the guide below corresponding to your operating system.

Always use sha256sum to verify the driver file hash against the manufacturer’s published checksum.

(e.g., Ralink RT3070 driver).

Windows Update sometimes pushes generic Microsoft drivers. To block: