AirPort - Self assigned IP address - no internet!

[MrBungleBear]

It is almost always the firewall

Got to System Preferences, Security, firewall tab, set to allow all incoming connections, go to the network pane, turn off airport and back on again - let it get an IP from dhcp, apply, then go back to security and turn on your firewall again.

This should work for ethernet too, although instead of a turn on and off of airport, you need to select your ethernet connection, go to advanced, ethernet, renew dhcp lease, then OK and apply.

G>

 

[slu]

Got to System Preferences, Security, firewall tab, set to allow all incoming connections, go to the network pane, turn off airport and back on again - let it get an IP from dhcp, apply, then go back to security and turn on your firewall again.

This should work for ethernet too, although instead of a turn on and off of airport, you need to select your ethernet connection, go to advanced, ethernet, renew dhcp lease, then OK and apply.

G>

In my case at least, it is not the Firewall. The firewall is not on on my Macbook and my iPhone does not even have a firewall. What I have noticed is that it seems to happen to all devices at around the same time. I have had it with this issue. My base station is still in the warranty period and I may return it for another one although I think that is going to be a waste of time. I just haven't had a chance to try a non-Apple router yet, but I plan to.

 

[MrBungleBear]

It's almost always the firewall

In my case at least, it is not the Firewall. The firewall is not on on my Macbook and my iPhone does not even have a firewall. What I have noticed is that it seems to happen to all devices at around the same time. I have had it with this issue. My base station is still in the warranty period and I may return it for another one although I think that is going to be a waste of time. I just haven't had a chance to try a non-Apple router yet, but I plan to.

Yeah, you're right - it doesn't sound like the firewall for you... More like a busted router...

G>

 

[Nirelleth]

I also have the same problem, when using the secured Wlan from my university.

I have a MacBook (MacOS 10.5.8) and the problem just started recently.

I live in a student dorm, and we have also Wlan here, but it also works really bad, so I started to use the Uni wlan in the dorm too (there is one building just across the street with one of the routers so it is close enough to work). for the first few days it all worked well, but then suddenly I started to have the problems with the Self assigned IP.
I don't have the firewall turned on, so it can't be that. I don't think its a problem of the router, as when I am in the main building of the uni, it works well, also there are many people using it, so Im sure it would have been noticed.

Today I went to the Techguy there, he made some changes, and it worked there for the moment, but as soon as I went back home it didn't work anymore again.

I have also set the settings in TCP/IP to "using DHCP" so that isn't the problem either.

Right now I am using the unsecured Wlan of the school u:connect, which works and doesn't give me the IP problem, but it can get very slow, so I'd rather no use this one.

So, any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[mescalito]

Just a note to mention that this problem still exists in Snow Leopard.

I've tried every trick available, with no change. Doing a reinstall now. Dammit.

Snow leopard screwed up my wifi. I tried a ton of things. What fixed it fir me was selecting "Join other network...". And manually entering in my network's name and password.

 

[whtlghtnng78]

I fixed mine

OK I have been dealing with this off and on for awhile. I have now conquered it! My macbook pro(OS X) would out of know just stop working and say in the airport "SELF ASSIGNED IP ADDRESS".

This is what I have done many times to fix it.

1. Turned airport off
2. Opened Network Connections(you can turn airport off here also)
3. Clicked on airport on the left in the Network Connection Window
4. Then I clicked on advanced (the bottom right of the Network Connection Window)
5. It should already be on airport tab. Click off the checked "Remember any network this computer has joined"
6. I also checked "Disconnected from wireless networks when logged out" I turned this on just in case. probably pointless.
7. Ok, now in the "Preferred Networks:" above the checks we just did. Clear all of those networks out. You want this box to be empty.
8. Make sure you do step 7. Clear all the "Preferred Networks"(click on the them, than toward bottom left of box is a plus and minus sign to delete them)
9. Now turn your airport back on but Do Not select your network yet.
10. Now turn you computer off for 15 seconds
11. Turn back on and you should be good. Now you can click on your network in airport.



This is what I do when it happens. When my airport starts working it asks me to allow 3 things(safari, ODSAgent, and nmblookup). Allow / Deny "If you deny it might cause problems..." I allow and it works. They Need to make something so you can reset these 3 things so you don't have to do all this stuff or go into firewall.

Make sure you do step 5. Or it wont clear them out. They will just come back after you clear them out. Follow instructions step by step and you should be ok.
Please come back if it works. So we know its not just me it is working for.

 

[zin342]

self-assigned IP Address

I run Mac OS X and recently I had a problem with my IP address. I changed the name and pass of my network and I then tried to connect to the same network again. But instead it connected me with a self assigned IP and I started having many IP addresses like 87.171.19 then 87.172.21 and 87.173.12. Then I lost my connection, I run "assist me", deleted all saved settings and I was able to connect to the correct address.
I would like to ask, when having such an IP where do I actually get the internet connection from and also if at the time it is dangerous to use credit card numbers and passwords in case they are hacked.

Thanx 🙂

 

[sleepwalkers]

had this problem last night....and fixed it. 🙂


I don't think it's an apple 'bug'.
more of a 'bug' with wireless technology in general..

going from this network, to that network,from this network to that, and all those numbers and passwords and encryption and wholly s#$t!!!!! somethings bound to screw up imo.....windows seems good at doing stuff you don't know about, so after a while you just reinstall windows when things get too out of hand....macs aren't good at doing stuff you don't know about...so they get clogged up with crap...to me, the wireless 'movement' is still an infant, but will get better as it becomes the standard obviously.....anyhooooooo........

whtlghtnng78 has the right idea, as do many others in this thread.

basically, delete your joined networks, trash airport preferences, reboot and rejoin your networks.....pretty standard 'apple stuff'.

so......

turn airport off.

system pref.>network>select airport>advanced>delete your preferred networks in the list......make sure tcp/ip is set to DHCP, which is what most routers/modems default to.

machd>library>preferences>systemconfig.>delete '.com.apple.airport.preferences.plist'

reboot.

turn on airport.

rejoin your network and if you're using wep on a small home network, put a $ before your key.

DOUBLE CHECK YOUR KEY AND MAKE SURE YOU HAVE TYPED IT CORRECTLY.....this can set osx into the self assigned ip hole, too.

launch safari/mozilla whatever.
internet should catch again.

you've basically just reset your network settings in osx is all.

I think it's that after a while of plugging in and joining all over the place, the network settings become corrupt and you have to reset them.

hope this helps!!!!!!!

 

[zin342]

Thank you!! 🙂

 

[TheAlchemist]

I seem to have tried everything suggested here with no luck at all 🙁. Im incredibly annoyed as i purchased an iMac on wednesday only to have the yellow screen problem and flickering, i return it friday and swap it back which was a nightmare lugging it around. I get the replacement back to my place and it has a worse case of the yellow tint than the previous one. The manager still disregards it as an issue with iMacs and offers me another swap. I end up hoping that their shipment of Quad cores will not have the same problem as their dual so end up forking out an extra load of money only to get it home and have this problem.

It has the self assigned ip address problem claiming theres o internet. However im using a MBP right next to it now with full signal and no problems, also have an iPhone connected with another generation MBP... If i have to return this iMac i will be furious.

 

[turbodork]

Based on this article:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1654663

I opted to try using WPA authentication instead of WEP and that seemed to solve the problem for me. I'm using the At&t Uverse router and I had to define my own password instead of using the default, otherwise it was pretty simple (5 hours later).

I agree. Was having a similar problem with a new MacBook on my wireless network. Machine was able to get online using my work & friends' wireless networks, but not my own (another older laptop I have at home was able to get out, though) so I totally reset my wireless router (search online for how to do for your particular model) and then set it up from scratch, but this time having it require a WPA password instead of a WEP one like it was originally set up to do.

 

[RGKleid]

Cleaning out joined networks etc.

I'm tying to join a network that I used about a year ago and I'm getting the "self-assigned I.P. address message" and can't connect. Apparently this network had some problems a few days ago and very few people could connect. They worked to repair the problem and now all Windows machines can connect. I don't think anyone had tried to get on with a Mac since then. We tried two other Macs and got the same errot with both . One is fairly new and shouldn't have a large record of joined networks. I'm a bit reluctant to clean out all of my known networks etc. because I'm afraid I'll just have additional problems joining my already recognized networks when I go back to them. Since three machines are having the same issue I'm tempted to think this is a router problem. Since this router is owned by a club and I have no access to it I think I'm stuck. The network is not password protected. Any suggestions?

 

[lex750]

I have the same issue. The real strange thing is that I have imported my network settings from a Time Machine backup and I don't have any problems connecting. It's when I switch to a different WiFi network then back to this particular one I get the, "Self assigned IP address". My network settings seem to get corrupted some how. I tried everything I can imagine, and have been searching for a solution for days. Nothing seems to work. I'm running 10.6.2

Edit: I'm also able to connect with my wireless router via a Linux USB Drive,without any issues. This must be a Mac OS X bug/feature.

 

[slu]

So, I am not going to get too excited yet as it has been just two days, but I may have finally fixed this problem.

I think the problem was my jailbroken iPhone 3G! I didn't have many Cydia apps installed. I had SBSettings, Cycorder, GV Mobile, StatusNotifier, PirvaCy, Backgrounder, Five Icon Dock, PDANet, and TV Out installed.

Once Qik came out and I found out that VoiceCentral is coming out with a Google Voice web app very soon (not to mention that I can use Google's Web Page, as crappy as it is), I figured I could live without the other stuff and go back to a non-jailbroken iPhone. I do miss SBSettings and StatusNotifier, but other than that, it has been fine.

I un-jailbroke my phone two days ago and I have not had an issue with the self-assigned IP address on any of my Macs or my iPhone since then. Now I have had streaks like this before, but in the couple of days before this, my iPhone was getting the problem several times each day. And things that would have normally given me trouble, like turning on my iMac or adding a new device to the network, have worked just fine.

But that is not all...I see that I first posted in this thread August 8th of last year, so I went back to see when I first jailbroke my phone. Guess what? I downloaded redsn0w on August 1st of last year! It seems like too much of a coincidence to me. Well, that and the fact that I tried all of the suggestions in this thread, replaced my router, and had this problem in both 10.4, 10.5, and on iPhone. It makes perfect sense. The jailbreak was the only thing that changed when this started happening. And these are the only Cydia apps I really use and have been using them since I first jailbroke.

So, I'd suggest that if you have a jailbroken iPhone with some or all of the apps that I had installed and you have this problem regularly, see if restoring it to non-jailbroken software helps. I don't know if it is one of the apps I had installed or the jailbreak itself that gave me trouble, and frankly I don't care.

I'll post again in a couple of days if things are still working. And since the un-jailbreak is the only thing I have changed, I won't change anything else until I am sure everything is working OK.

 

[sananda]

I think the problem was my jailbroken iPhone 3G!

I have discovered the same thing. Whether with a 3G jailbroken with Redsn0w or a 3GS jailbroken with Blackra1n, any Mac joining my Time Capsule's network directly after the jailbroken iPhone will have a self-assigned IP address.

 

[slu]

I have discovered the same thing. Whether with a 3G jailbroken with Redsn0w or a 3GS jailbroken with Blackra1n, any Mac joining my Time Capsule's network directly after the jailbroken iPhone will have a self-assigned IP address.

I am so glad you posted this. I half expected people to think I was crazy! It makes even more sense that you have a time capsule since I have a Airport Extreme Base Station and I had the problem before when I was using a network comprised of Airport Expresses.

Perhaps people don't see this problem with non-Apple routers?

And I had jailbroken with Redsn0w the first time and then I upgraded the firmware to 3.1 and jailbroke with PwnageTool.

I liked my jailbroken phone a lot, but if I had known this in advance, I never would have done it.

 

[fcarral]

Change network ID

I solved it by linking to my dsl modem though the ethernet cable... changed the network id and problem solved....
Only works of course if you can control these variables... good luck.

 

[slu]

I just wanted to give a final update on this: my problem is solved! It has almost been a month and I have not had a self-assigned IP address on any device since I restored my iPhone to factory firmware.

Again, if you are using an Apple router and have a jailbroken iPhone, I recommend un-jailbreaking to see if that helps.

 

[Bluebirdsalon]

Solution!!!

Hi,
I joined this forum just to respond to this post. I want to help the other poor souls who are suffering from this "self-assigned ip" bull. I was having what I believe to be the same problem as you:

I have a macbook pro that is connecting wirelessly to a motorola router. I never had a problem connecting until a few days after I installed snow leopard. The internet was working one minute and then stopped working. I noticed that I was getting the "self-assigned ip" message.

I read tons of posts over the course of a few days and was feeling pretty frustrated at the lack of clarity I had as to the solution for my problem. I tried all of the typical solutions with no avail.

Finally, I made this one change:
Under the network that I wirelessly connect to, I re-entered the password preceeded by $. That's right - enter the dollar symbol and then your normal password. It worked like a charm! How my ip address and my network password are related, I cannot say. But try this!

All I can say is what the f*7$?!!! And Thank God!!!

 

[BobToss]

Time discrepancy

I joined this forum having read every post and tried everything suggested. I think there may be multiple issues preventing people connecting. My mac was working fine for 8 months then suddenly wouldn't allow me to access web pages - Airport could see my wireless router, but the web wouldn't display (IP address issue I think). All my other wifi devices connect, no problem.

So in the end I found a link relating to my router (provided by my ISP) with instructions on how to change the router's time server. I remember reading that a discrepancy between the router's time settings and that of the wireless device can cause problems. I updated the time server & normal service has resumed. 🙂

So, it's probably worth checking the router's time settings. My router's manual didn't have info on how to do it, so Google your router or call your ISP or router manufacturer and ask them how - that's my advice.
😡 Win7 🙂

 

[jneedles]

I Got It

I've been having this issue too. I think I got to the BOTTOM of it--

ISPs assign 1 IP addres to "a device" be it a router or a computer.


IN ORDER TO CHANGE DEVICES, the DHCP must be broken/released.


MACS CANNOT DO THIS THEMSELVES. (renew DHCP does NOT accomplish this)

The ISP must do it remotely.

THIS MEANS if you are going directly to your modem to your MAC computer, then unplug and connect a NEW computer, the new MAC computer will not be able to break the DHCP assigned to the first computer.

You have to either A. call your ISP and they will break the lease or
B. unplug the ethernet cord and wait THIRTY MINUTES for the DCHP to renew automatically.

If this is happening while a ROUTER is plugged in, the router is busted, or needs that renewed DCHP.

After trying every kind of setting in network preferences, i've realized that all that stuff does NOTHING, and simply waiting 30 minutes/utilizing a router that can assign multiple IP addresses/calling ISP is the ONLY way to deal with this issue.

Perhaps in the future, Apple will provide an effective way to break the lease.

GOOD LUCK and I hope this helps others

 

[gerf]

works beautifully . . . no more problem !!!!

I was having the same annoying trouble. I had never had a problem with using networks at home or at other places until I went to a coffee shop tonight, and then it all started. It continued to not work even once I got home and attempted to get on to my own network.

So what I did was I went into network preferences, advanced option for airport. Then I went to TCP/IP settings and set configure IPv4 to off. Then I applied the conditions and exited out of network preferences. Then I went back to network preferences and went back to TCP/IP settings and set configure IPv4 to using DHCP with configure IPv6 off. That worked for me, it assigned me a new IP address and no problems now. 🙂

I was having the problem as described by almost everyone else on this forum and followed the instructions above .... and hey presto ..... no more problem ..... posting this to the web wirelessly !!!!

 

[margoesmattress]

This worked for me some time back

Hi,
Some time back I had a similar problem of being unable to connect to the internet. I had connect to our network, problem free for more than a year. Then all of a sudden it wouldn't work. I also got the dreaded 'self-assigned IP address". After going round and round with Linksys and Apple, one of the techs gave me the suggestion to type in $ before the password. Simple as it sounds, it worked. No problems since.
Good Luck

 

[3runjosh]

I've had this problem twice on Snow Leopard. The way I fix it is reset your modem (not the router). The modem is not sending the right info to your router so it needs a reset. Good luck

 

[designeq]

my solution to self-assigned IP addresses

I have had this problem several times, the latest after migrating my system to a new computer. I tried all the standard techniques described in this and other threads to no avail. This is the solution that has worked for me each time this comes up:

Go to the terminal window.

Paste in: sudo ipfw -f flush
Enter password

(This flushes all firewall rules)

Then turn Airport off and then back on.

In my case, after turning Airport back on, it made the connection without further problems.

Interestingly, I had to do this even though I had the Firewall turned off completely. I can't say I understand why this worked but it has for me several times, so I hope it will be useful to someone else who has this incredibly frustrating situation.