Q: MacBook Pro constantly losing wireless connectivity

Thanks jordibut, but, as discussed at length earlier in this thread, this is an onboard Airport issue. Not a router issue. The problem occurs everywhere (wifi cafes, libraries etc).

All I can say is that it's been working for me and you can't argue with results.

I've had no problems again today and compared to how it was, that's awesome. As I said, it probably not a solution for everyone, but it's a simple enough to give it a try.

Having the same problem with frequently losing WiFi connectivity I uninstalled Realplayer and this proved to be solution. Highly recommended!

Thanks. I've been trying all sorts of solutions and this has helped for now. I just set up a ping in terminal when I start using the wireless, and it doesn't lose connection. THis is my first Mac, and I'm really frustrated at how many different things I've had to try. I love the interface, but if this is the sort of problems I'm going to encounter with a mac, I might be better sticking with pc.

Resorted to getting airport card and antenna replaced while still under applecare. So far, so good. It's been about 9 hours and haven't lost my connection yet (except of course when my VOIP phone adapter quits, but that's another story. Good luck everyone.

Hey guys,

Reading the post by GLA42 on hiding RealPlayer Downloader under Accounts|Login Items I decided to have a look at what I had under that tab. I do not have RealPlayer installed on my mac, but I did see iTunesHelper and MicrosoftMouseHelper. I chose to hide both of those to see what might happen, so far after rebooting my wifi is quite speedy. I'm going to see how long this lasts and will post a followup after I have a chance to try connecting at school and work. I will have to say that I'm really disappointed in Apple's lackluster/nonexistent response to this problem. I'm sitting next to my girlfriend and her new Toshiba, and she's been connecting to my router without any trouble whatsoever, trying to make me feel stupid for trying to talk her into a Mac. Good luck everybody, I hope this helps.

Just another, with a twist...

I've had this problem for months now, only on my MBP (2.2, march 2007) running Leopard (now 10.5.6), not with the Macbooks that other people have at work or with a wide variety of PCs. I have tried most of the workarounds in this thread.

1. I connect to the wireless network at home with no problems whatsoever. DLink Dir635 Router running mixed mode with WPA2. NetUtil reports 130Mbit/s. Not what N promises, but speeds are good.

2. I connect to the wireless network at work (DLink switches and APs: DWL3200AP, b/g mixed mode). I sometimes need to turn Airport on and off to get a valid IP on arrival, but it works. I have excellent speed both on the Internet and working on local servers.

2.1. A random time between 2 seconds and 45 minutes pass. I lose Internet connectivity but still have a valid IP, DNS servers... and can still work on the local network and servers with no problems at all. Two people working near me on Vista and XP machines never have this problem.

2.2. I need to turn Airport on and off (a few times) to get connectivity back. On good days I lose Internet connectivity twice, on bad days... every couple minutes. It doesn't matter if I'm actively using the connection, such as streaming video.

I used to blame it on the network, but now I'm pretty sure it's a software issue on my side. Win XP with bootcamp works fine. No drops. About 120 other laptops work fine (no other MBPs).

Ha have tried many of the solutions on this thread, but still need to try some others and report back:
1. Run full virus check.
2. Manually set DNS for that location.
3. Disable IPv6 for that location.
4. The dreaded... backup and reinstall OSX Leopard and go slowly through patches.
5. Roll back to original OSX Tiger.

I hope it doesn't come to testing the last two... but I'll report back. I'll take any suggestions in the meantime... The whole "I have wireless local area network access but no Internet" is really confusing, especially since nobody else in the office has that problem.

I have a very similar problem to you. At home my wireless works fine, but now that I am back at school on a WPA Enterprise 802.1x network I lose internet. I will also have to turn off the Airport and turn it back on to get back on the net.

I have fixed the issue temporarily by reinstalling Mac OS X (to 10.5.5) and it stays connected. BUT if I update, via Software Update or an Apple Download, to 10.5.6 it goes right back to dropping every couple minutes. This is incredibly annoying and I have reinstalled Leopard multiple times to try to isolate the cause. So far 10.5.6 is the cause for me. I can update everything but 10.5.6 and it will work, but the second I reboot into 10.5.6 I encounter constant problems.

Right now I am running 10.5.5 and will probably not update again until I get a resolution to this problem from Apple.

Well, I'm running 10.4.11 and have this problem so I don't think it's a 10.5.x issue per se.
I also followed nando1977's advice and it hasn't worked either. Nothing has worked including getting a new airport card and antenna from Apple repair. This is ridiculous.

Reporting back and replying:

1. I ran a full virus scan via Clam and found nothing. Checked specifically for DNSChanger trojans, but found nothing either.

I have had the problem since 10.5.2 (when we deployed the new network), so it's not specific 10.5.6... I thought this last update would fix it, since it mentioned improved stability roaming in large networks. But no.

Today I have lost connectivity less with the manually set DNS and no IPv6, but still have had two issues in the three hours I've been at the office.

As a side note, it worked fine before we set encryption in the APs (WPA personal). When APs were open, I had no problems.

Will keep reporting back and checking for solutions.

OK, so this is the second attempt at writing this post because, guess what, connectivity dropped! Thanks to all that have posted. I was beginning to think it was my doing something wrong on my new Macbook and AirPort set up (despite a WinPC having no issues (side-by-side).

This is really spoiling what has otherwise been a great experience as a mew Mac user.

Back to report:

I tried the manually set DNSs to no avail.
I tried running iStumbler to no avail.
I tried deleting all the Configuration files in HD/Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration, restarting and recreating locations... to no avail.

So far, the only thing that brings back connectivity is turning Airport off and on.

I don't really want to reinstall the system, but might have to just to try another solution... it's such a pain. I feel as if my Mac were a PC... reinstall the system? Is this Windows?

Any other ideas? Has anyone managed to solve the issue at all? Has anyone got a satisfactory response from Apple? There must be thousands of people with this problem... if it is hardware related Apple will never acknowledge it (it would mean they have to give us all new computers). If it is software, it doesn't seem to be worked on... the first post in this thread is a year old!

I am very disappointed with Apple. Apple, please do something about this!

Just one more attempt: FAILED.

I read in another support forum that someone had solved similir issues assigning a static IP address to his MAC. I went ahead and did that (over at the DHCP server) but nothing changed. I still lose connectivity randomly (only Internet, since I can still work on the local network wirelessly). I also set OpenDNS to no avail.

Still praying for more ideas and possible solutions.

Others may try the static IP (reservation in DCHP server or router)... maybe it works for them.

Finally, is there a way to roll back the system to MAC OS 10.5.1 and before Airport Update 2008-4 without reinstalling the whole OS?

i've had similar issues with a mackook pro , macbook and macbook air and
I've manage to make work by changing the AP settings to : wpa psk , enable ssid broadcasting and b only.

Thanks for the help, Seth. Unfortunately I cannot change the security or disable b/g in the WiFi at work for just one computer. However, we do enable SSID broadcast and use WPA psk.

One big difference that I had forgotten to mention is that our Access Points use VLANs and broadcast 4 SSIDs (VLANs) each. That might be important information for troubleshooting. So far, I haven't been able to make it work consistently.