Q: Late 2013 Macbook Pro Retina 13'' Wifi Issues

I had gone into the 'genius bar' which always denies knowing of ANY problems with their wonderful machines.  When I showed him the MacWorld article about this issue he then admitted that Apple knew about it.  Lying b******s.  Anyway he said it was either a software, hardware or firmware issue.  I said 'Gee, what's left?  Underware?'  He did say that it may be a security authentication issue with home networks since I had no problems connecting with the Apple store's open network after sleep.  He also said that it would not make a difference whether it was a 2.4 or dual band router.  My Google Nexus 7 connects wifi and bluetooth instantly on my 2.4 router with no conflicts. 

monty88haynes-

Your computer is seeing the slower, more crowded 2.4GHz band, which usually indicates that is all that your Router is putting out.

You are connecting on Channel 11, which is one of only THREE Channels in this band. Typical top speeds here are 72.2 unless you use Multiple streams. It appears you ARE using multiple streams to get a Transmit speed of 130. Signal Strength (RSSI) of -65 is pretty good. MCS index of 15 says you are able to use the most complex modulation scheme available. Overall, this is a good connection.

Your Mac may be trying to find a different Network. To stop that, be sure you have Airport at the TOP of the list (not as shown below, because I use Ethernet as my main connection).

Be sure you have checked the " [√] Ask to join new Networks" box:

In addition, make sure that only the Networks you want to join RIGHT NOW are shown here:

If you often go to a different place and use a different Network, you should set it up using a different named "Location". A "Location" collects all the settings you need and can apply them in one click, for example, to turn on your Mac FireWall and connect to a particular network with its password (if any) when at Starbux.

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Hi Grant,

Thanks for the analysis but I don't have airport and I have tried creating a Home network and deleting all the other networks but nothing works consistently like it should.

My screen shots are old, and the terminology has been updated from "AirPort" to "WiFi" for exactly the reasons you suggested.

Sometimes when folks are at wits end, and have already done all the right things, the desperation move is to use ( Assist Me ) >  ( Assistant ) set it up again from scratch, being sure to specify a new "Location" instead of the default.

OR you read the signs and accept that the Mavericks WiFi driver on the current MBPr is a big ugly mess.

Ive also gone through two macbooks, several routers, clean installs, apple support.

Please somebody post a screenshot where i see the 802.11ac working smoothly and somewhere near its capacity. Show me and i will believe.

Add me to the list of people having this issue.

Macbook Pro late 2013

OSX 10.9.4

I'm connecting to a netgear ac wifi router. Confirms it's in ac mode when checking the wifi list and a transmit rate of 600Mbps (capable of 1.3Gbps mode but the range isn't as good).

The connection stops at random times or usually when I resume from sleep. The wifi indicator still indicates that I have an active connection but I get no traffic. Turning wifi off and on again fixes the issue for a while.

What I've done to try and fix the issue:

• Bluetooth off
• Booted into safe mode to run a check on the startup volume
• Created a new location in system prefs-->network
• Booted into recovery mode and repaired permissions/disk
• Changed channel on the router
• Changed wifi ac transmit rate of the router
• Changed over to the 2.5Ghz band on the router
• Changed wifi security type of the router
• Tried various wifi access points (My work and a couple of friends wifi connections)

I'm still having the issue after all of this and it happens on multiple wifi networks. As soon as the wifi drops I immediately check my iPhone and the wifi is still working.

Lets hope there is a driver update to fix this. It doesn't happen all the time but when you pay the premium for an Apple device you expect it to work or have these issues fixed quickly. Can't believe it's July and nothing has been done to fix this yet.

rhirons-

10.9.4 has some fixes for some of those issues. It has been generally available for about a week. Some users reported their problems fixed.

Hey Grant,

Sorry I meant 10.9.4. I'll update my post.

For me the issue comes and goes! this is super weird!

Funny fact: I enabled BT and now the wifi is connecting all the time!

apple's stance is non-action as evidenced over these many few yrs

Thank you for your suggestion. I had changed my router's setting (specifically changed the wireless channel from Auto to 6). It worked so well

You got lucky. That is only a temporary solution if you have a lot of nearby networks competing for the THREE clear channels available. Sooner or later your neighbors will move to Channel six and fight with you.

The recommended procedure is to leave your Router set to "Automatic". When it is slow, cycle its power. As it powers up, it will evaluate the amount of traffic on each available channel. It will pick the least-used Channel, "Automatically". That will give you best performance, unless conditions change. At that point, "cycle the power to your Router" and it will choose the best available at that moment.

That is why "cycle the power on your Router" is so often step 1 in problem-solving these issues.

Well that's just great. Now my Late 2012 Mac Mini (OS X 10.9.4) started having this same issue today. All of a sudden it doesn't like its Bluetooth Keyboard / Magic Trackpad anymore, and loses its WiFi connection/Bluetooth keyboard when waking up. And no, it isn't a keyboard battery problem.

Great.

Bluetooth uses the same part of the crowded frequency spectrum already populated with baby monitors, cordless land-line phones, microwave ovens and all of your neighbors' Routers. But bluetooth does not use the same modulation technique, so it just adds noise.

The long term solution if you can see more than a few neighbors' Routers is to upgrade to a dual-Band Router, and use the 5GHz band. It adds several more channels, and they are wider.