Airport extreme keeps dropping connection and its driving me crazy

I finally got my extreme working.
The only thing really work for me is to change my network from 802.11n (5Ghz) to 802.11n (2.4Ghz).

My guess is the wireless phone I have (5Ghz) is affecting the wireless network.

ehdindigo wrote:
Everything was brilliant until last night when I updated Airport via Software Update. HOW DO I UNDO THIS UPDATE?? Is it possible?

Mine worked flawlessly until the Airport firmware update. Sounds like a lot of others incurred the same problem after the update.

Sounds like Apple needs to patch it.

That is exactly what's been happening to me. I'd get these "hiccups" and the bars would go entirely grey. Before the firmware update I'd have a fluctuating signal, I could deal with that, now it's either there or not there. All or nothing.

AIRPORT DROPPING CONNECTION:
I am having the same problem. I am using a brand new iMac 8.1 - 24 inch with 2 gig ram and 500 gig HD.
Running Leopard 10.5.4
Airport base station is a "snow" that is several years old.
My iMac is about 36 INCHES from the base station. I have 2 other Macs in the house in other rooms and they don't drop the connection at all. They are (running Tiger).
Problem occurs at startup or when waking from sleep.
I start with a strong connection - then it drops out after about 30 seconds. It will not come back on its own. If I click on the Airport status icon in my menu bar it will say ""Airport scanning" and when it finally says "Airport On" I can wait and it may come back. I sometimes have to do this 2 or 3 times before the connection is restored. On occasion I have to turn Airport off on the iMac and then turn it back on before the signal is restored. The interesting part is that after a while (usually about 30 - 40 min, the signal becomes stable and does not drop out. But if I sleep or shut down, it starts all over again. Very very frustrated. Has anyone got a fix for this?

I got an Airport Express N based last month to set up my wireless connection last month based on my PPoE internet. Connected to the wireless network I have a MBP 15", MB 13" and iBook G3. Since Monday, my MBP is having connection issues and is dropping wireless connection. Looking into the problem I found 3 things:

1.- on MBP "AirPort has a self-assigned IP address and may not be able to connect to the Internet"
2.- Connection drops specially when MB 13" is connected to the Wireless
3.- It seems MB 13" and MBP are sometimes sharing same IP which produces de conflict but at the end MB 13" always wins and it is leaving my MBP out of the network (no idea how to change that)

So I reseted Airport Express N based to factory settings and created a wireless connection again. Unfortunately, the problem still persists even though I reinstalled Leopard on both machines

Wireless security is WPA/WPA2 Personal
even I tried to assign IP to each mac on AE
any help will be appreciated __

I've had dropout problems for ages - not even sure how long. I notice them most when streaming iTunes to my stereo. Anyway, I followed the suggestion to disable all my widgets and reboot. Amazingly, that seems to have solved the problem - haven't had a dropout for the past 30 minutes. Can't remember the last time I was able to listen to NPR without near-constant loss of signal. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this is a permanent fix (though disabling all widgets is a pain, as I do use several of them regularly. Guess I"ll try re-adding them one at a time and see if/when it starts dropping again).

I was experiencing the same problem, but i may have found a solution. I accessed my router and I saw that it was on automatic channel selection. I then searched for the channel with the best signal (on mine you can choose from channels 1-11) and left my router set to that channel, turning off the automatic channel selection. I think that maybe every time the router switched channels the signal would be lost. I also turn on the interence robustness option in the airport utility, because I am only using this to stream my airtunes. My connection has been green and stable ever since. I hope this helps cause when functionong properly this is a great product especially now since you can control iTunes with an iPod or an iPhone. Feedback on this would be great, because I worked on this for a couple hours.

ok, Here is the Answer

when the airport first connects to a wireless network it hasn't had time to measure the signal strength yet, so it just assumes it a full signal.

It isn't actually lose strength it just calculating accurate strength.

Message was edited by: geek3

I suggest you try DNS Changer Removal Tool available for free from http://macscan.securemac.com/

Okay so I had a massive problem with my wireless connection, which started abruptly just over a month ago. The connection would suddenly drop, try to re-establish itself, then drop again preventing any App from connecting to the Internet and playing havoc with local network transfers. I was using an Airport Extreme base station with four clients, two Windows PC laptops, a MacBook Pro and a relatively new iMac 2.8. Of all the computers, only the iMac showed this symptom, the other computers connected just fine without the drop-outs. I read through this thread and none of the remedies solved the problem permanently, it always came back eventually. I tried repairing permissions, resetting PMU, zapping the PRAM, setting and re-setting the base station configuration file through a whole variety of tweaks - nothing. I trashed Pref files, turned off and trashed widgets, rolled back the OS to an earlier version, rolled back the base station firmware (currently 7.3.1) - still no joy.

The only thing that cleared the problem, and as I write I've gone 24 hours without a drop out, was a re-installation of OSX 10.5 that came with the iMac. Following that I updated to 10.5.5 Combo, and everything is working fine.

I did an archive install, but elected not to have my network preferences and the like carried over to the new system, effectively beginning all over again.

My theory is that something deep in one of the network drivers, a kernel, was damaged during an update and the only thing that seems to have fixed it is a semi-clean install. Yes it's a pain re-entering serials and the like for the major Apps, but obviously to have a stable wireless internet connection, I'll happily deal with that. I was still able to use a lot of files from the 'Previous System' folder anyway.

Someone in this thread mentioned Parallel Desktop, I suppose it's possible that this somehow caused a problem, although I'd been using it for ages previously without a problem up until the last PD
update. If this was the culprit, simply uninstalling it didn't rectify the problem.

I'm inclined to think that the damage was done during a Software Update, but for some reason, running the 10.5.5 Combo doesn't repeat the damage. Or possibly the Base Station firmware upgrade - 7.3.2 - caused an OS conflict and rolling back the firmware didn't undo it. I don't know, I only know that the connection is now completely stable and is running as it did before all this nonsense began.

Just thought I'd share..

Hello:

I recently began experiencing a similar situation as the one described here. For background, I have the following setup:

- Airport Extreme Bases Station 802.11n 7.2.3 firmware
- PowerBook G4 OS X 10.5.5 (wireless network connection)
- MacBook Pro OS X 10.5.5 (wireless network connection)
- MacMini OS X 10.4.11 (wired network connection via airport extreme)

All computers and hardware have the most recent software updates installed.

For reasons I have yet to diagnose, my MacBook Pro dropped its wireless network connection today and wouldn't reconnect. However, the PowerBook's wireless connection was fine as well as the Mini's. I checked the Airport Extreme's status via the Airport Utility and had green lights across the board. I should mention that my wireless network had been performing flawlessly for over 2 years and I had made zero changes to the network prior to the problem. Following is my network configuration:

AIRPORT - WIRELESS & ACCESS TABS (private information not included)
------------------------------------------------------------------
Radio Mode: 802.11n (b/g compatible)
Channel: Automatic
Wireless Security: WPA/WPA2 Personal
Create a closed network: Yes (checked)
MAC Address Access Control: Not Enabled

INTERNET CONNECTION
-------------------
Connection Sharing: Share a public IP address

Here's what I attempted to solve the problem and the results:

1. Turned Airport connection on and off multiple times on MacBook Pro (failed)
2. Restarted MacBook Pro (failed)
3. Deleted network configuration from Network settings and keychain; rebooted MacBook Pro; recreated network settings (failed)
4. Repaired permission (failed)
5. Reset PRAM (failed)
6. Reset Airport Extreme to factory settings and rebuilt network using same configuration listed above (failed - though all other computers could connect)
7. Logged in as different user (failed)

I tried all of the above multiple times and nothing worked.

So, what worked:

ANSWER: I unchecked the "Create a closed network" check box in my Airport Extreme's network configuration, clicked the update button, and when the Airport Extreme restarted - BAM, my MacBook Pro instantly connected to the network.

I've restarted the MacBook Pro multiple times to make sure it wasn't a fluke, transferred 17 GB of data across the network from my MacBook Pro, and everything is working fine.

QUESTION: Why would not hiding the SSID have any impact on my MBP connection and why would it just happen after working fine for years? Updates, bad wireless NIC in my MBP (I doubt this because I can connect to other wireless networks with hidden SSIDs fine), what...

I'll update if I figure out what caused the problem and if the solution isn't long term.

Hope it helps.

Cheers

I have had wireless problems since I had a logic board change on my 2007 MacBook because it kept restarting whilst in sleep mode which was very annoying. Since then it won't remember networks on awaken and even on restart. Eventually the guys at the Genius Bar sent it back to Cupertino where they swapped logic board, iSight and wireless card. Guess what THIS DID NOT FIX IT.

I was having problems of the signal dropping on my airport extreme at home which runs on G and N. Hidden SSID and could it find it? NO. And when I eventually got on it I'd be booted off or suffer from connection constantly dropping in and out and in and out.

Back in the UK, I run a router on B/G and I have created my own N network using an Airport express. Some days it just refuses to find it. It failed to find my own airport express and couldn't even remember the password 5 times in a row. And then kept failing and failing. It can't even find the main router when the SSID is hidden. My airport is broadcast so should be simple. Sometimes I click on the airport icon and it shows all my preferred networks with non-joined and refuses to join. Sometimes it won't show anything.

The thing is, on the days it can see all 3, the airport signal will just drop to nothing, so I switch to the other and it's full signal. My airport will just do this, I'm only one floor up but as soon as I sit with my Mac on my lap I lose signal and then put it back on the floor and it goes back up to max. And then occasionally I just get thrown off and can't get back on and it refuses to find it. It's a bit of a joke really. I spend more time trying to fix this than I do doing work/using the internet.

I've used cocktail to set it to N, got it all set up. Have removed and reinstalled all usable networks. My console just show rows and rows of failures.

I am at the point where I want to throw my mac out of the window. IT IS BEYOND A JOKE. I have been to see Apple so many times, funnily enough the problem doesn't replicate in store! So I made a video to show them the failings and they kept saying it was my network... but my bro on his older mac (2005) doesn't have a problem, nor does my Dad on his iMac (2006). My 3G iPhone doesn't have a problem either nor does my Mum's iPhone.

COME ON APPLE SORT THIS OUT. I refuse to lose my Mac for more weeks on end while you run console and have a look at it. Something is fundamentally wrong and I'm sick of sitting on a LAN cable.

My mac used to be amazing - would be on wireless as soon as I lifted the lid or as soon as it started up. Not any more...! This morning I just gave up and went straight to the LAN cable.

I found a work around that is working (so far) to my recent wireless problems. I've tried most of the suggestions posted on the user group pages (smart reset, hard reset of airport, etc.) and also spent maybe 3 hours with Apple Care running through other solutions (configure new network, trash caches, and many other things I don't understand).

I've had many short-term solutions, but they usually fail soon after I start surfing the internet again.

I read on one user group a suspicion that my use of Parallels could be contributing to the problem. That's what led me to this work around.

I went to Network Preferences. It was set to automatic. In the left-hand window, I had the following networks listed:

Parallel . . . -Guest
Parallels NAT
AirPort
FireWire
Ethernet
Bluetooth

Per another suggestion from a user group, set up a new location (Home 1) and tried to reorder my services so that Airport was at the top of the list. I was able to do that but I saw that the computer kept reordering my networks. My theory is that the computer turns on my airport card, but then the Parallels networks take over and the Airport is turned back off.

So the work around I've now tried is to create a new location (Home 2) and deleted the Parallels networks from that location. As soon as I did that and hit "Apply", my wireless came back on full strength. Still running strong.

I'm now going to try to boot up my parallels and see what happens. If I can't boot in my currently location, I'll revert to Automatic or Home 1 and see if I can boot into Windows from that location. I'm posting this now since I'm not sure I'll be able to get back on line after that test. If I can, I'll post again.

Hope this helps someone else out there who is pulling out their hair trying to solve this wireless mess!


Update:

Everything seems to be working as expected. When I use my alternate location (Home 2), I can't use Parallels to access windows.

When I switch back to location "automatic", I can open Parallels but have only intermittent wireless. When I switch back to Home 2 again, however, I have full wireless access.

I'm on the road right now so I'll have a chance to see if this system works across multiple wireless networks. If this system stops working, I'll post another update. Otherwise, this seems to have solved the wireless problem on my computer.

Hope this helps!

I am already in "Link-Local only" mode and it has been dropping connections.

The iPod Toch is not "N" speed only "G" so your AEBS is going to drop down to broadcasting at "G" speed when the Touch is connected. This means that your signal will be reduced and will not extend as far.

At work we have a router that is only for "N" users and another one for "G" users.