GOD HELP ME.... PLEEEEASE [eMac wifi problems]

Forgive me for asking a really, really stupid question, but you did get a BTO with an airport card? The eMac, unlike the iBook, doesn't come supplied with a card as standard.

Like I say, sorry for the daft question but I always like to rule out the most obvious solutions first...

Have you checked to see it's lodged in properly? Does it recognise any wireless networks and not connect or does it just flatly not see them?

Excuse the simplicity of this answer. Have a look along the top right of the menu bar. If you have airport, there should be an Airport symbol (little arches going up from small to large). If you have signal, the arches will be black, if they are grey then you don't. If you have no signal you may need to tinker with the network settings... but it should "just work".

i suspect the ariel is not plugged in.

If you download this widget, does it find any networks?

Another obvious one but are your wireless networks broadcasting their SSIDs? (i.e. are they in hidden mode or not). If they are hidden you will need to type in the name of the network.

robbieduncan said:

Another obvious one but are your wireless networks broadcasting their SSIDs? (i.e. are they in hidden mode or not). If they are hidden you will need to type in the name of the network.

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That's where I thought the widget might help because it wont pick up non-SSID-broadcasting networks, right?

mad jew said:

That's where I thought the widget might help because it wont pick up non-SSID-broadcasting networks, right?

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I don't see any reason why it should. I thought the whole point about not broadcasting your SSID was that your network was "invisible" (although you can still see the traffic using the correct tools). I think that widget will only see what the standard airport tools can see.

robbieduncan said:

I don't see any reason why it should. I thought the whole point about not broadcasting your SSID was that your network was "invisible" (although you can still see the traffic using the correct tools). I think that widget will only see what the standard airport tools can see.

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That's what I hoped. The widget can then rule out any errors on the eMac software-side meaning the problem is most likely wither that there are no broadcast SSIDs or that the card isn't seated properly.

AP_piano295 said:

is this a common issue?
please understand I dont want to be tearing it apart unless it can be avoided brand new and all

Click to expand...

Try calling applecare, they should be able to help you over the phone.

robbieduncan said:

I don't see any reason why it should. I thought the whole point about not broadcasting your SSID was that your network was "invisible" (although you can still see the traffic using the correct tools). I think that widget will only see what the standard airport tools can see.

Click to expand...

No. Simply not sending your SSID doesn't make your network safer. Tools like Kismet http://www.kismetwireless.net/ are able to detect such cloaked wireless networks. Even restricting the MAC addresses of the computers that are allowed to connect doesn't help - MAC addresses can be easily spoofed. Encryption is the only way to secure your WLAN.. alas, the current encryption isn't very strong. So, basically WLANs simply cannot be made safe.

weg said:

No. Simply not sending your SSID doesn't make your network safer. Tools like Kismet http://www.kismetwireless.net/ are able to detect such cloaked wireless networks. Even restricting the MAC addresses of the computers that are allowed to connect doesn't help - MAC addresses can be easily spoofed. Encryption is the only way to secure your WLAN.. alas, the current encryption isn't very strong. So, basically WLANs simply cannot be made safe.

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I realise all of that. Each thing you do to make it more difficult to hack your network makes it more likely that the "evil hackers" will target your next door neighbour though. Not broadcasting your SSID is enough to stop your generic bandwidth leach (especially with MAC address locking).

my guess is if he had a non-broadcasting ssid, he would know it because that is not the default for any vendor i know. same with mac filtering. and yes, with heavy traffic i have gotten a wep key in under 10 minutes. however, due to a totally different encryption scheme, wpa is much (read: really really hard) to crack in a short period of time (read: less than a day). no encryption is perfect, but any is better than none.

my wireless wardriving efforts have all been on linux, but the principles of setup are the same. if the default os wireless is not working, the best way to see if your card is working is to get a 3rd party wireless option. If kismac is anything like kismet, give it a whirl. It will pick up all broadcasting and non-broadcasting in range no matter what the settings are. If that picks up nothing or doesn't recognize a card, you can go from there.

Also, have your friend come over or anyone with a wireless card and make sure that your router is up at the time you try to connect, just to be sure.

AP_piano295 said:

how often are airport extremes faulty?

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Never, in my experience.

However, sometimes, the card isn't seated properly (can dislodge during shipping). It's an easy fix, and doesn't involve "tearing the computer apart". It may be worth trying, as it's a common issue and would prevent it from working.

Here's your instructions.

.

AP_piano295 said:

if the card was dislodged would you still get an indication that you have a card?

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I don't think so, what does the Apple system profiler say?
Does it say you have a card?

AP_piano295 said:

if the card was dislodged would you still get an indication that you have a card?

Click to expand...

Probably not. It depends how much it's dislodged though. Most likely, if it is dislodged, there'll be no data transfer between it and the eMac so the eMac will not know it is there.

AP_piano295 said:

yes just no signal

Click to expand...

Did you try to manually connect to your network? Click on the airport symbol on the menu bar, then click on "other." Enter your network name, password, etc.