How does Airport prioritize WiFi connections?

[parish]

My MBP 3,1 (early 2008?) normally just connects to my WLAN when I start it up but very occasionally it connects to a nearby WiFi Hotspot. When it does, turning Airport off then on again sometimes gets it to connect to my WLAN but sometimes it just keeps re-connecting the the hotspot. The only solution - and it works every time - is to reboot. But rebooting seems such a Windows thing to have to do.

Does Airport "prioritize" its choice of connection, e.g. first tries to connect to the last WLAN it was connected to?

One other thing. If I go into Network Prefs and click the Advanced button, I see my WLAN there but there seems to be no way to tell it to connect to that particular WLAN - the equivalent dialogue in Windows for example has a Connect button so you can select a WLAN and hit connect to force it to (try to) connect to that one, but there's no Connect button in OS X.

In case it's important, I don't broadcast the SSID on my WLAN.

 

[rdowns]

System preferences>Network>Airport>Advanced>Airport tab

 

[aristobrat]

To connect to a wireless network, do you not have the Airport icon on your top menu bar? Clicking on that should show you a list of nearby networks, and clicking on a particular network should join it.

 

[iLog.Genius]

System preferences>Network>Airport>Advanced>Airport tab

From there you'll be able to drag/reorder which network you want AirPort to connect to first.

 

[parish]

System preferences>Network>Airport>Advanced>Airport tab

From there you'll be able to drag/reorder which network you want AirPort to connect to first.

Yes, that is the "Advanced" dialogue I was referring to in my OP. My WLAN is there - and top of the list - but very occasionally it just will not connect unless I reboot.

 

[aristobrat]

That's weird.

Before you reboot next time, try turning your laptop's AirPort off for a few seconds and back on. Wonder if that'd accomplish the same thing as a reboot?

 

[iLog.Genius]

If it doesn't work, your airport .plist file might be messed up.

Macintosh HD/Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration

and move the com.airport.preferences.plist to the trash (password is required)

By doing so, you will have to re-enter all your passwords again for all networks.

 

[parish]

That's weird.

Before you reboot next time, try turning your laptop's AirPort off for a few seconds and back on. Wonder if that'd accomplish the same thing as a reboot?

That works most of the time, but every so often it doesn't

If it doesn't work, your airport .plist file might be messed up.

Macintosh HD/Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration

and move the com.airport.preferences.plist to the trash (password is required)

By doing so, you will have to re-enter all your passwords again for all networks.

Thanks, I'll try that, although if this is the cause it seems curious (to me at least) that it manifests itself as an intermittent problem.

As it is, it's not a great problem as it happens so infrequently it's just that having to reboot to fix something seems so Windows and un-Mac-like.