Airport Extreme and Powerbook

[edge540]

For the last couple of days, about 2, I have been having problems with my airport om my powerbook. The wireless network that I have in my house seems to be lost sometimes and the only way to get it back is to turn off the airport on the computer and wait about 5 minutes, turn it back on, and usually the network is back. I know that it is not a problem with the range of the network as when I have acquired it I have full strength, and noone else in my house looses the network either. Sometimes when this happens I can only hold the network for a minute or less. This is really anoying and I need to find a solution so that I can use the internet. I think I can also rule out software problems as I zeroed my harddrive and did a clean install of Tiger last night. The problem still persists. I believe I am going to swap cards with another mac user in my house to see if the same problem occurs when he uses the card.
Does anyone have any ideas on how to resolve this problem or has anyone herd of the airport extreme cards going bad on the powerbooks? I have the 1.5GHz 15" bought last summer so the warranty is gone on it.
Thanks

 

[mad jew]

It's pretty unlikely that an AirPort card will go bad. It sounds like you may have some interference. Maybe try broadcasting the router (base station) on a different channel. In the AirPort Admin Utility there's a drop down box with a list of channels on it. Play around with that to see if there's a better one.

 

[edge540]

But how would interference just pop up out of nowhere and affect only me and noone else in the house?

 

[mad jew]

There are quite a few ways. For instance, your neighbour may have just set up their own source of interference (such as a wireless network, a microwave, a cordless phone or whatever) that only you are in range of and therefore it is only affecting you. Try the different channel just for fun at least.

Next step may be to open up the PowerBook and make sure a small jolt hasn't slightly dislodged the card. Push it firmly back in. Make sure you earth yourself before playing around too much in there though.

 

[edge540]

Yea... there are no neighbors within 100 yards or so... but I did take the card out and use some compressed air and blew some dust out... then I firmly replaced the card. So far so good. Well see how it goes.

 

[mad jew]

Compressed air - good idea. Hopefully it was just a slightly loose connection.

 

[p0intblank]

I'm having the same problem as you right now! I woke up this morning with no Internet radio playing in the background. I checked the Ethernet connect on my Windows machine and it worked just fine. So I took that cable and plugged it into my PowerBook and connected like usual. But my Airport Exteme is working now... so let's hope it says that way. I gotta wake up to music!