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Can anyone help me out? (Airport drops)

D

Diggity Dang

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 25, 2007
26
0
Hey Mac Lovers,

Quick question that I've been pulling my hair out over... I have had a MBP for about 6 months now which I have been connecting to the internet via wireless router (Linksys WRT150N). I'm currently using OS X 10.4.11. For the most part, internet is lightning, but every half hour or so, or when I let the Mac sit idle for a few minutes, it drops. Airport says I got a full signal, but Firefox and Safari are lights out. This seems to have only started happening when I had to re-install everything because of some stupid thing I did which wiped a bunch of things out.

I've been reading about some issues with both Tiger and Leopard. Is this the issue they're talking about? Is this the issue that Apple is 'working on'? Does anyone have any recommendations for me? This CAN'T be how the Mac OS works... after all the wicked stuff I've heard about the Mac's just 'working' (in comparison to Windows PC's).

Any help would be totally appreciated.

Thanks all!
 
What gets the connection back up and running? If you reset your router, does it work again normally for a while? It could be a router on the way out...
 
Ahhh yes... I love it when someone else starts to feel the Linksys pain... eases my own that I went through with their crappy range of routers. Sorry dude, I feel for you, if it turns out to be a router issue, just kick it to the kerb like I did with the 3 garbage units I went through.
 
Ah man! You guys sayin' you think it's a router issue? I did try re-setting it on a couple of occassions, and it did work for a bit, but opening up my airport connection usually gets it going after a minute or so, so that's my usual course of action.

I'm on my second router... maybe have to try again??? I'm glad you guys're enjoying this! hahahahaha...

In the meantime, if anyone else has other suggestions, I'm open to tryin' other things too...
 
I'm not saying it is a router issue so much as it being something to look at. Do you have access to another router or network you can use for a while to see if the same thing happens?
 
Thanks mad jew... gonna take a look first before shelling out cash for a new one, for sure. But, if it helps, I have a Windows PC laptop on the same router with no problems connecting.
 
Ok, thanks again... will try seeing if my old router gets the same problem.

Appreciate the input.
 
Me Too

I am experiencing the exact same thing ever since I upgraded to Leopard. Did not have the problem in Tiger. It is not the router, my wife's vista PC is working fine. The only way I can get mine to reconnect is do a restart of the machine.
 
Could it be a compatibility issue that Mac's are having with certain routers?? Is that even possible??

From the other forums I've read online, this seems to be a widespread problem, and a really annoying one at that!! How can Apple not be making a fix/patch for this one of their top priorities??

So, for all the people experiencing the same problem, is everyone just simply "dealing with it" by rebooting, or waiting until the connection gets re-established??
 
Still doesn't work from sleep mode

I did the adjustments indicated and it has stopped dropping the connection to my wireless while I'm working which is a big improvement. However, I still can't connect after I come up out of sleep mode. The airport utility shows I'm connected but my email or safari won't connect. I did not not have this problem before I upgraded. It i a secure network and I suspect there is an issue with authentication. To connect I have to do a restart on the mac.
 
I'm up and down on drops again... I'm pretty sure it's not a physical router issue anymore, but perhaps a settings issue. Not sure why the changes described on the Linksys page helped, but it did. I am only dropping on occassion now (one every hour or so), which is a huge improvement for me as well, but like blueiiiiiiiis, I'm usually hanging when I haven't been active for awhile (I have my sleep setting at 'never' though). Not sure if it will help, but I've found that plugging my charger in, along with opening my airport connection, sometimes gets it going again.

Anyone have other suggestions/solutions?
 
i'm totally stumped. i've tried the settings in the post above, even though i use a different router (a netgear n-enabled yada yada - WNR834b v2).

my house has a macbook, macbook pro, iphone and a lenovo thinkpad all connecting wirelessly at various points. the lenovo has never had any problems no matter what the settings have been. in fact - neither has the iphone.

the macbook and the macbook pro, on the other hand, have a hard time keeping the connection. sometimes (1/50) it will drop while actively browsing. mostly it drops after it wakes from sleep(3/4). both machines are running 10.4.11

we've disabled the 802.11n spec; we've taken security off of it as well. we used reserved IPs for the troubled machines. we upgraded the router software. i tried changing the channel, thinking interference might be the issue. none of these techniques has made a difference.

so far, the only way i can 100% reliably get the computer to reconnect is to reboot. OR if i turn the airport off and then on again, it will work. but with varying results. sometimes it takes one airport restart to get a functioning connection again, and other times it takes upwards of 6 or 7 airport restarts to get it working again. other times no matter how many times i restart airport, it won't connect.

often it will give me a self-assigned IP address, and other times it will show me a valid IP from the range specified in the router - but still not connect.

so i'm stumped. i take the macbook and macbook pro out to coffee shops, and have NO trouble. i can connect flawlessly to random neighbors' networks.

i paid for my internet connection, and for my computers. can't find a straightforward reliable answer despite heavy searching.

any ideas, anyone? much appreciated.
 
drawstring said:
i'm totally stumped. i've tried the settings in the post above, even though i use a different router (a netgear n-enabled yada yada - WNR834b v2).

my house has a macbook, macbook pro, iphone and a lenovo thinkpad all connecting wirelessly at various points. the lenovo has never had any problems no matter what the settings have been. in fact - neither has the iphone.

the macbook and the macbook pro, on the other hand, have a hard time keeping the connection. sometimes (1/50) it will drop while actively browsing. mostly it drops after it wakes from sleep(3/4). both machines are running 10.4.11

we've disabled the 802.11n spec; we've taken security off of it as well. we used reserved IPs for the troubled machines. we upgraded the router software. i tried changing the channel, thinking interference might be the issue. none of these techniques has made a difference.

so far, the only way i can 100% reliably get the computer to reconnect is to reboot. OR if i turn the airport off and then on again, it will work. but with varying results. sometimes it takes one airport restart to get a functioning connection again, and other times it takes upwards of 6 or 7 airport restarts to get it working again. other times no matter how many times i restart airport, it won't connect.

often it will give me a self-assigned IP address, and other times it will show me a valid IP from the range specified in the router - but still not connect.

so i'm stumped. i take the macbook and macbook pro out to coffee shops, and have NO trouble. i can connect flawlessly to random neighbors' networks.

i paid for my internet connection, and for my computers. can't find a straightforward reliable answer despite heavy searching.

any ideas, anyone? much appreciated.
Click to expand...


According to this thread it's a bug that affects many: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1144909&tstart=15

One suggested approach to sidestep the bug:

In your Network system preference, you probably have more than 1 preferred network listed in the Airport pane. Go in and delete all except 1 preferred network.. "San Onofre Wireless."

Also, make sure you leave the setting under the Options button named 'Automatically add new networks to the preferred networks list' UNCHECKED so it doesn't add more on it's own.

Try this and see if it works for you.
 
airport loosing connection

thanks for the posts... after wasting 2 hrs trying to sort the settings on network preferences, i read this thread and unpluged my netgear rangemax. bingo - my powerbook g4 (os leopard) is back in business. g5 had no problem... nothing has been the same since leopard. grrrr.
 
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