wireless doesn't seem to exist anymore on laptop

I am working on an HP dv6171cl and somewhere in the last 2 weeks, the
wireless has malfuctioned. The orange light never turns blue and the
wireless is gone from my device manager and just simply doesn't seem
to exist anymore. I connected to a new home wireless network about two
weeks ago and since then have been working off my school's ethernet
network so I never noticed when the problem began. I updated the HP
wireless assistant and when I click it on the control panel, nothing
happens. I've been to three different tech supports. The BIOS seems to
have minimal options. The only thing turned off is the 'internal
network adapter' when I look through it.

My computer store wants me to reset the laptop to factory settings. I
want to know if this is hardware or software problem and how to figure
out if it was somehow internally disabled. I am a fulltime law student
and the last thing I want to do right now is completely start over
with this laptop.

Any suggestions?

.

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