Macbook Airport does not see wireless networks/Bootcamp Win7 does

[maxxscholten]

Hey guys, here's an odd problem that started a few months ago:

One day I noticed that my Macbook was having trouble find ANY networks available (despite knowing that many were available) - it doesn't see any. Occasionally the Airport will pick up a network or two with extremely low signal strength (even if the wireless router is in the same room) but usually has issues connecting and eventually the network disappears from Airport.

At first I thought my Airport had totally crapped out and so I had to go out and spend $100 on a third party USB wifi stick (there are very few companies who make these for Mac, but for PC they can run for $15 ).

Now the crappy design of this USB wifi stick I purchased has caused the USB head to become bent and is ultimately deteriorating.

SO, recently I noticed that when I use Bootcamp to run Windows 7 on my Macbook, Win7 is able to fully use my built in Airport hardware and receives great signal - so now I'm thinking that it may not be a hardware problem at all.


Any help would be awesome.

 

[iLog.Genius]

Navigate to Macintosh HD/Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/

and delete com.apple.airport.preferences.plist and preferences.plist (you will need to enter in your login password if applicable) and then restart your computer.

Post back your results.

 

[maxxscholten]

Navigate to Macintosh HD/Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/

and delete com.apple.airport.preferences.plist and preferences.plist (you will need to enter in your login password if applicable) and then restart your computer.

Post back your results.

Thanks, I tried your advice but alas, I still have the same issue. When I select the Airport drop down menu from the top bar it'll look for networks for approx. 1-1.5 seconds, not find anything and stop.

Thanks again for your advice.

*Also, just to put it out there: In System Profiler, my Macbook finds my Airport hardware just fine.

 

[scott2206]

Had the same issue just deleted those files and rebooting now...

... now seems even more pants saying airport "airport not configured"...

... Ill have a play. if nothing i copied those files to external HDD.

p.s I'm on my sisters pc at the moment

 

[Superdrive]

Sorry to bump the thread. My MacBook was experiencing the same issue today. I was able to browse just fine on my home network, however when I came back to the computer after a short idle period, no wireless networks could be detected (I live in a complex). After restarts of the computer, network, etc, I had no luck.

I'm currently away from the place on my iPhone, but look forward to trying the fix. I'll report back the results tonight.

Does anyone think it could be an antenna issue since the MB detects the airport card just fine?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Superdrive]

Well, I tried the MacBook at the airport and at my parents house. Both times, it went right on to the networks. Quite an odd, phantom issue.

 

[digital821]

imac will not find any networks

I recently installed a new HD in my 1.83 GHz Intel core 2 512 MB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM

I'm running 10.5.4

After I installed the HD and then installed the OS the computer started up fine and everything works normally except for the airport. The airport drop down says "no networks selected". I have no idea what is going on.

In network preferences; next to the airport these is a yellow ball and it says the airport is on but not connected.

I've tried several locations and the computer does the same at all locations.

I'd understand if it could find a network but not connect, but it wont find anything.

 

[pieperm]

Sorry to bump this thread up, but I'm experiencing exactly the same issue like the TS.

Did you ever fixed it, and have others probably a solution?

I already did a PRAM and SMC reset, new locations and so on...