Intermittent wireless on powerbook G4

[dutchmac]

Hi All,

We have had a little powerbook G4 since about a year now. Such a great little stable machine that we have never had any problems with it. As a consequence, we still know little about it (usually I learn about machines/software by running into problems). Now, the wireless starts working internittantly. Sometimes it works fine and at other times it will not even indicate that our home network is present (whereas we have two other laptops (Win XP) that show that the network is active and has excellent strength). So at these times we are unable to re-connect. This started about two weeks ago and starts to get worse (it will more often not find it). Restarting does not work, but sometimes, when trying again the next day or a couple of hours later, it will work again.

So what can this be? Should we just go ahead and get a new wireless card for the p-book? Is this a common issue?

Thanks for any input!

Tim

 

[deadpixels]

could be a loose airport card or airport antenna.i don't know where the card sits in a 12" PBook but in my previous 1.25 Alubook, it was easely accessible, just had to remove the battery.

 

[dutchmac]

Thanks for that one. Checked the card. Seemed to be installed proper and in place. To make sure I pulled it out and re-installed firmly. It's working now but like I said, it could drop in an hour or so. Will keep updated.

Any other suggestions? How common are problems with the airport card?

Tim

 

[deadpixels]

Thanks for that one. Checked the card. Seemed to be installed proper and in place. To make sure I pulled it out and re-installed firmly. It's working now but like I said, it could drop in an hour or so. Will keep updated.

Any other suggestions? How common are problems with the airport card?

Tim

on the three pbooks i owned, never had a problem with airport hardware, only problem i got a few times on my alubook, like million others, is the dreaded "self assigned IP address problem" but nothing else

 

[dutchmac]

on the three pbooks i owned, never had a problem with airport hardware, only problem i got a few times on my alubook, like million others, is the dreaded "self assigned IP address problem" but nothing else

Forgive my ignorance, but what is that "self assigned IP address problem"? You mean it assigns itself an IP? Could that have something to do with what I am experiencing? I mean if it assigns itself an IP it would probably not be interested anymore looking for that from a DNS server, right?

Thanks, Tim

 

[deadpixels]

Forgive my ignorance, but what is that "self assigned IP address problem"? You mean it assigns itself an IP? Could that have something to do with what I am experiencing? I mean if it assigns itself an IP it would probably not be interested anymore looking for that from a DNS server, right?

Thanks, Tim

it's a common problem when your router cannot assigned an IP address to your mac. the mac sees the router and is connected to the wireless network but your internet doesn't work.when you have this problem your IP in the network prefs pane is starting with 169.254... (that's the IP you get when the problem is present). in your case you said the mac does not see the network, that's why i thought maybe a loose airport card.

 

[fateshand]

on the three pbooks i owned, never had a problem with airport hardware, only problem i got a few times on my alubook, like million others, is the dreaded "self assigned IP address problem" but nothing else

OK this is my exact problem. It is so frustrated. My computer keeps assigning a self assigned IP address. How is this problem fixed?

 

[deadpixels]

OK this is my exact problem. It is so frustrated. My computer keeps assigning a self assigned IP address. How is this problem fixed?

sorry but i don't know exactly, when i had the problem with my alubook 1.25, i kept using the cable and it fixed itself after while. at the time i looked around for solutions and found a bunch of them (including resetting airport prefs, shut down machine, remove battery and airport card for a while, reset PMU ...) but none really worked. what you could do is see if there's a firmware update for your router (is it a dlink?). for more tips you could do a search for "self assigned IP address" over at apple discussions and see what comes up.