Q: MacBook Pro constantly losing wireless connectivity

peder42 wrote:

 

William, what you seem to not have considered is that it is quite possible for some error to exist that only shows up in some particular conditions. The fact that the far majority of macbook pro users experience no problems does not mean that there cannot be an inherent problem with all machines which only other users experience due to the problem shoving up only in some specific situations.

No, I've mentioned just that before, which is why I say to always contact AppleCare so that they have enough data to detect patterns.

Given your example, I suspect a bug in your router's firmware rather than a problem with Mac OS X, as the same holds true with your router's firmware and Mac OS X.

The example I've given numerous times before, is say your router has a bug where it calculates "2 + 3" as "5" but "3 + 2" as "6."

Every PC and past versions of Mac OS X could have always added "2 + 3" and Lion may (completely correctly) change things to calculate "3 + 2."

Of course the same could true for Mac OS X, where it gives the wrong answer to someone asking for the result of "3 + 2."

I get "invalid password" and a shake of the dialog box. Totally random. Worked today then didn't til I clicked the network to manually connect then another time gave invalid password again. So difficult to diagnose. My router is a dgn2000. Might call apple.

Make sure you are using 802.11b for wireless. Check your modems settings and search system preferences for any network settings that may cause this. I had this happen before and did the exact same thing i said and got it fixed.

Doesn't that stop you using 802.11g (let alone n!!) on any other device?

When I first got my MBP it had a few wifi issues but things got much better and for the past 6 months or so its been reasonable.... but since the latest update its been terrible! Dropping out every 5 mins or so.

William Kucharski wrote:

 

peder42 wrote:

 

William, what you seem to not have considered is that it is quite possible for some error to exist that only shows up in some particular conditions. The fact that the far majority of macbook pro users experience no problems does not mean that there cannot be an inherent problem with all machines which only other users experience due to the problem shoving up only in some specific situations.

 

No, I've mentioned just that before, which is why I say to always contact AppleCare so that they have enough data to detect patterns.

 

Given your example, I suspect a bug in your router's firmware rather than a problem with Mac OS X, as the same holds true with your router's firmware and Mac OS X.

 

The example I've given numerous times before, is say your router has a bug where it calculates "2 + 3" as "5" but "3 + 2" as "6."

 

Every PC and past versions of Mac OS X could have always added "2 + 3" and Lion may (completely correctly) change things to calculate "3 + 2."

 

Of course the same could true for Mac OS X, where it gives the wrong answer to someone asking for the result of "3 + 2."

I'm sorry, but that makes no sense whatsoever and is totally unhelpful. You have absolutely no basis to suspect that there is a bug in his router's firmware.

lionmom wrote:

 

Make sure you are using 802.11b for wireless. Check your modems settings and search system preferences for any network settings that may cause this. I had this happen before and did the exact same thing i said and got it fixed.

That's not actually a solution. If switching to 802.11b fixes the problem for you, then either your wifi router doesn't support anything but 802.11b and that's the right setting for _your_ network, or the MBP doesn't work properly. MacBook Pros claim full support of 802.11g and 802.11n. I am using mine on 802.11n exclusively. It might be worth someone seeing if 802.11b seems to work better than other settings, but you should still call AppleCare.

A follow-up to my original post in July 2011. I'm not sure exactly why, but the problem of not being able to connect has almost completely gone away for the last couple of months. I assume some sort of update came out that helped my situation, but it's hard to say since the release notes aren't very specific around that. I'm able to connect at home (using a TrendNet TEW-639GR, 802.11n with WPA2 Personal), at work (Cisco, 802.11n with WPA2 Enterprise) and at any other wifi hotspot. Occasionally I need to close/re-open the lid before the network is recognized, but it's become fairly rare.

Anyway, I'm much happier with my investment and I hope the situation improves for the rest of you.

mapar70 wrote:

I'm sorry, but that makes no sense whatsoever and is totally unhelpful. You have absolutely no basis to suspect that there is a bug in his router's firmware.

I have as many if not more reasons to than the original poster does to suspect it's Lion.

Same issues here with lion and macbook pro august 2011. The solutions posted everywhere, including changing your network location to just wireless and no LAN, removing all other wireless networks from your preferences list, etcetera. do not work. These solutions were also suggested to me by AppleCare, they did not have any further tips. I'm using the laptop in 4 different locations, all with different types of routers, always the same problems. Sometimes they go away for a few weeks, but they always come back. I hope there will finally be a _proper_ solution for this soon, not some kind of hacking of the system preferences.

I originally had a MBP earlty 2011 with Snow Leopard 10.6.8 preinstalled - I found Wifi dropped, not all the time but a few times a day.

Due to hardware issues Apple have given me a new MBP (late 2011 with Lion 10.7.2 pre installed) and still get the issues.

It's not a major problem, more an inconveniance but you still hope for better from Apple based on the price your paying.

Having looked through these posts and tried several suggestions this appears a non-currable issue which may be something you have to live with.....unless Apple to address it.....hopefully soon

Then we're not experiencing the same problem, I just kept getting prompted.

Are you using WEP or WPA pasword. I remeber reading something about needing to add a $ sign before the pasword for one of them to work or something...

You can always try to change the encryption from/to WEP/WPA and see if that helps? I also seem to remember something about some "repair-keychain" thing, where you could fix problems with keychain access. Because it sounds like your MBP just cannot seem to find the right password, eventhough it's stored in your keychain!

Sorry I could not be of more help, best of luck to you buddy!

I don't see the point in arguing, thats just time better spent trying to help eachother.

I admire you for standing up for a product/company you like, I love my Mac to. In the long run I guess Microsoft has provided their users with equally, or more issues in some way or form. I do however agree with most people here, there are to many other devices (including apple devices) that do connect for this to be a hardware- or router problem. I went through 3 routers before my "still temporary" fix started working, with all other devices still working as usual.Though I do NOT thing that there is a bigger conspiracy to buy apple products, these things just happens, and obviously were are all experiencing what seems to be relatively different problems, which adds to this statement.

Let's just bury the hatchet and stop wasting time and energy on pointing fingers!

(By the way, the original posts are from 2008, Lion was probably not even in development back then. )

Thanks. Can't use WEP, it's completely useless as a security measure, might as well have no encryption at all :-)

It seems to happen less frequently now, not sure if any of the changes have caused that but I haven't been called by an annoyed wife for a few days!

Weel, it's friday and I'm about 3 beers and 0.5 L hard liquer into the night, so again please excuse any spelling errors on my behalf. Won't be giving any technical advise tonight...

Yeah, WEP kind of *****, I really don't see how this would affect anything anyway, just one of these standard suggestions...

The way I persieve it is that there are ~three more obvious explanations, either there is a software error on the MBP which makes it "loose"/fail to provide the correct password to the router (BTW, did you find the "repair keychain" thing?), two; your router is either configured to "block" your MAC/IP adress in some range somewhere (though this is really unlikely since you'd have to have set these things yourself. Finally, third, you have set the wrong password on the router/computer, thats why it keeps prompting, though this is the least likely of the above.

Let me ask you some other quick questions, have you "re-installed" the OS?, maby used time machine to transferre some apps/files or the entire OS?

Have you ever used/installed any P2P/IP-filter security software (peerguardian or similar?)

Have a really nice weekend!

//Cheers