I have tried everything I could find on the internet.
I have looked through the logs.
I have looked in /boot/config.txt
I have looked at /proc/devicetree
I have tried other distributions
I even removed the case and inspected the antenna to make sure that it was OK.
I wish that someone can give me a chain of events and files that I can trace through in order to verify
that the internal hardware is working.
I find it hard to believe that the hardware shipped with defective components. (but that is my only other conclusion)
It would be nice if there was some sort of diagnostic tool to verify the internal hardware.
Hi David,
this might explain it a bit more for you?:
Click on the forum links and search their forum. 
Thanks, but that was the latest distro that I had tried. The UI works but it shows NO Devices.
I am beginning to think that the chip for wireless failed. I saw reports of it over heating. i wouldn’t have noticed it because I was waiting for the software updates. Anyways, the proprietary software used by the PI seems to be an achilles heal for it. I have been in that place before and it can get ugly when you find out that the manufacturer decided to change the chip’s internal code without telling anybody. If Broadcom were smart they would have a linux app that displayed the status of their chip. Right now the board will do what I want. What I was looking for was a board that I could load with software and let it run. Unfortunately, the Pi 3 ain’t there yet. And since it uses the device tree stuff, I won’t ever have confidence in the hardware. You are always one firmware update from a nonfunctional hardware situation.
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@David_Johnson, I have a similar problems with my PI3. It has become unreliable from boot at connecting via the internal wifi adapter. I access the PI over SSH from my laptop on the LAN. Sometimes, the PI will appear after booting, but recently this has becoming more difficult. I discovered I could easily access it by ethernet and suspected the built-in wifi was faulty. Using ethernet, I installed a USB wifi adapter. Subsequently, all boots (about 20) have been successful.
At first I thought the problem happened after a firmware update, but I re-installed an older image (using fsarchver) and it made no difference. I have tried / on a USB drive with no success. I am convinced the hardware is faulty. (BTW, when I first got my PI, reboots were sometimes unreliable but I suspected I had done something wrong, now I think it was faulty from the beginning.)
I have written to the retailer of my PI with a warranty claim.
Thanks. I tried a usb dongle and wifi works fine with it. ruling out a software general configuration problem. The only reason that I bought the PI 3 was to eliminate two dongles, which then eliminated a powered hub. I now know that the internal wif is a “swiss army knife” equivalent of a radio interface.I doubt that I would have been happy with its performance. I think that they made an unfortunate choice to include wifi and bluetooth based on proprietary software. I have seen the same problem with the RFDuino. Once I got into the stack level it was a black box that wasn’t worth troubleshooting. Based on what I have learned from Snowden’s and Kaspersky labs revelations, I no longer trust a lot of hardware with software firmware. I will be looking for radio solutions that have their firmware anchored in concrete and bulletproof. I am designing an offline electronic newsletter/forum like the Pirate Box. I have a working Pirate Box on a tplink mobile router and it is pretty impressive, I want more power so that it can synchronize inside a house from a passing car. I will continue using the PI but I am leaning towards a radio interface in the ISM unlicensed band.
@David_Johnson I’ve disable the onboard Broadcom wifi by sudo modprobe -r brcmfmac. To make permanent, add brcmfmac to /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf. (Ethernet and Bluetooth remain active.)
My PI3 is now using a USB wifi dongle without the need for a USB hub. It seems very reliable so far.
Update: after firmware version 4.4.11, onboard wifi is working reliably. Further update to 4.4.13 and still working without any disconnection.