New uMBP drops off wireless frequently

[randy98mtu]

I just got a new 13" MBP last Friday. I love it, but it constantly loses its wireless connection. I am connecting to wireless gateway that came with my AT&T DSL connection; a 2 Wire 2710HG-B. I have had it for over a year and have not had connection problems like this. I have 2 Dell laptops (E1505's, one has an N card, the other just a G) and an ATV connecting to it all the time, plus a Wii and a PS3 connecting to it periodically. I locked my router on G and channel 11, but it's still dropping repeatedly. I've lost and regained the connection twice while typing this message. Is this a setting somewhere or is there something wrong with this new machine? I see other people have had problems with these computers so I thought I'd post and ask before making a Genius appointment. Do I need to get an N access point? I've been wanting a MBP forever and this is getting frustrating, but I know I'll get it figured out. Thanks for any tips.

 

[BittenApple]

It's the 2wire modem/router. It doesn't play too nicely with Macs. Anyways they are crap routers anyways, picking up a new N router would be good.

 

[jpur]

You can also try updating the firmware on the wireless router.

 

[randy98mtu]

Thanks. I'll look into the firmware on the router. I've read that ATT DSL doesn't always work well with other brand modems, so I think I'm stuck with this 2 Wire. I have also read that the 2 Wire doesn't always work well in bridge mode (modem only) I may be able to find the standalone Motorola modem they sell and hook that to an Airport or some other router. I wasn't planning to spend all this extra money, but I want to get a reliable network setup.

Thanks for the tips.

 

[laughingperson5]

Agh. I think I have the same router for you. What's going on for me is that the DSL and Internet lights would go off. DSL would turn on blinking red. Then Steady Green. And then Internet would turn steady green. It's bothering me just a little but AT&T just suggests to me 2WIRE routers. -__-

 

[BittenApple]

Thanks. I'll look into the firmware on the router. I've read that ATT DSL doesn't always work well with other brand modems, so I think I'm stuck with this 2 Wire. I have also read that the 2 Wire doesn't always work well in bridge mode (modem only) I may be able to find the standalone Motorola modem they sell and hook that to an Airport or some other router. I wasn't planning to spend all this extra money, but I want to get a reliable network setup.

Thanks for the tips.

Just disable wifi on your router and connect a new router to the existing one. Problems are just for the wifi side.

 

[randy98mtu]

Has anyone used the Dlink DAP 1522? It's a gigabit switch/Wireless N dual band (selectable) access point. I just bought a gigabit switch, so I can return that and go to this instead to get my wireless taken care of at the same time. I'll leave the 2 Wire on B/G duty and use this on N only. Thanks in advance for any experiences with this one.

 

[randy98mtu]

I got the Dlink 1522 and started setting it up last night. I'm having a problem getting it working using N only. When I am on N only, I can connect and it can find web pages and other computers on my network, but any real amount of data won't move. My Time Machine never gets past 1% of calculating changes. I tried to copy a file from my iMac and it initiates and then just sits at 0KB and is calculating the estimated time. I switched the router to G only and all these things work as normal. I have tried 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz with the N only setting. 20 MHz and 20/40 channel width. I am using a WPA password. When I gave that to my MPB, it listed it as WPA2. I disabled WPS and turned off the SSID broadcast. I left those the same when I changed to G only and it worked fine. One thing I didn't touch yet was enable auto channel selection. But again, it was also on auto when I tried G only and it worked. I don't have the computer with me now to check and see that my machine has a/b/g/n, but I can't imagine I need that N enabler. That would be really sad if I need to pay $2 to turn on N in a new computer bought last week, so I'm assuming that's for older models. Plus I am actually connecting, it's just not able to move any real amount of data.

Do I need to make changes to something on the advanced wireless tab like RTS threshold or fragmentation threshold? I don't know anything about these things, so I don't want to touch them if I don't have to.

Thanks for any tips.

 

[randy98mtu]

In case anyone was watching this or has the same/similar problem, I fixed mine. I turned off security and the network started working fine. So I set it to WEP instead of WAP2 and it works great.