Can't reconnect to hidden WPA2 network

I have the same or similar issue.

I have a 2nd gen 32GB iPod Touch, and I use it alot at work. We have 2 wireless networks, one for guest's and the other for staff and faculty which is hidden.

With the version 2.x iPhone OS software I could connect to the secured hidden wireless, and it would more or less work fairly consistent, until password changes, and for the most part it worked into version 3.0, until I was asked to help troubleshoot a student iPod, and in which case I told the ipod to forget the connection and now it does not want to remember it.

I recreated the connection on my iPod, and everytime the screen locks, it forgets the connection. Very annoying, as one of the nice things is that when it is connected it will go out and get my e-mail, and stay updated with Exchange with push.

I tried the iPhone Config utility that was as about as worthless as tits on a boar pig. I created the profile in this utility, pushed it to my iPod, entered my credentials, and nothing.

Details of the network are (as seen in WinXP)

Security Standard is WPA2 running AES Encryption
Using IEEE 802.1x Authentication
EAP type: PEAP (Protected EAP)
Authentication Method: Secured password (EAP-MSCHAP v2)
Fast connect: Enabled

Typically all I need to do to get it working in the iPod is the following

Go to Settings | Wi-Fi | Other
Enter the SSID or Name
Security: WPA2 Enterprise
Username: DOMAIN\User or User@Domain.Local
Passord: User Password
Mode Automatic
Join.

It used to remember all that and work great. I don't know if it was 3.0 that broke it, or some rev afterward, but it is getting really annoying to have to re-enter the information everytime, and using our guest SSID is just as annoying as a user still has to authenticate using a SSL webpage, ironically it will auto-join this ssid, still have to enter credentials, but it auto-joins it.

Any one have any luck getting the iPhone configuration Utility to get this to work?

Ok, I found a solution, at least it worked for my iPod Touch. I went to Settings | General | Reset | Reset Network Settings.

This seemed to throw away everything in my network settings, and when it came back, I re-entered my Network settings, and seems to be holding the one I posted about earlier. http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=10468603#10468603

I have restarted my iPod several times now, and turned the wireless off and on, the screen has locked, and still my hidden network settings come back every time I go back into my iPod.

I hope this helps.

I have the exact same problem with my iMac. The fact is I have two wireless networks saved on my network preferences, the SSID is correct, the password is correct, the security type is correct, but there is no way the iMac will reconnect to any of them when the SSID is hidden.
Just by switching on the broadcast SSID option it works perfectly, when it is off the Mac is blind and not able to connect to it. As the settings for the network are exactly the same, the only change I perform is on the access point side, I assume this is a Mac OS X problem I hope Apple is able to solve in the near future.
All of my Windows machines work just fine with hidden SSIDs and no, I'm not going to make the SSID visible just because the Mac is not able to handle it.
By the way, my two access points are from Linksys.

I've had the same problem as PJVDias with at least 3 different Macbook Pros (mine, my sister's, and my mom's) on three different Time Capsules (my mom's, my sister's, and my sister-in-law's), all with WPA2 Personal, hidden SSID, and MAC.

I did not have this problem until I recently bought two of the newest time capsules, one for my mom and one for my sister in law. So far my macbook pro does autodetect my own time capsule at my house (fingers crossed that it keeps working). Strangely, I recently gave my 18 month old time capsule to my sister and got a new one for my home. The old one worked fine for me over the 18 months that I had it. The new one at my house also autodetects and connects just fine. But after setting up the old one at my sister's house, my macbook pro no longer auto detects and connects. All the settings are correct in my airport settings, and if I simply click "Join other Network" and enter the same settings, it connects and works fine. It works fine without interruption and with a strong signal until I either turn off the computer or it goes into sleep mode. I'm not sure it always disconnects in sleep mode, but it does sometimes. After disconnecting, it will never automatically connect again.

Again, as soon as I re-enter the exact info that is already in my airport settings it connects without a hitch. Only problem is that it won't automatically connect to hidden networks ... and these networks are all at the top of my networks priority list.

At first I thought this was a problem with the time capsules, but given that others are reporting the same problems with linksys routers, it must be a software problem with OS X.

Any new suggestions would be welcome.

Oh, another strange thing, when I gave my old time capsule to my sister, I had MAC set up, and my sister's macbook pro was not on the list of devices that should have access. Nevertheless, she was able to connect to the time capsule wirelessly and change the security settings. Scary! After that, my macbook pro would no longer auto-detect/auto-connect to that router, even though she did not change any settings relevant to my computer connecting. So maybe it is only the computer that last updates the settings on the time capsule that can autodetect it??? I don't know.

I'm also not willing to make the hidden networks visible. I'm surprised it has taken this long for there to be much discussion about the issue. I'm afraid the problems are still not defined enough for Apple to take quick corrective action (fingers crossed that others will start reported specifics of their experiences soon too).

It seems more appropriate that you repost this in the Airport/Time Capsule forum - http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=140

This is the iPod touch forum, and while we deal with these issues, your question could best be answered by the users in the other group.

Hi Scott (A A P L),

Just wondered if you'd had any update from your contacts in Apple about this one?

I'm assuming that this is still affecting iPod Touch and iPhone users who like me have upgraded to 3.1.2 (7D11)?
I tried the Reset Network 'fix' a couple of days ago and thus far it does seem to now be working ok. That said I've not tried adding more than one network with a hidden SSID, so there's probably further investigation I could do. Also as I've obviously I've only reset the config recently, this needs a longer term test before I can confirm it as a 'fix'.
Has anyone else who's reset their network config on their device had the problem re-occur?

Again the SSID is hidden as part of a corporate security policy for audit compliance, so no chance of getting them to change it unfortunately.

In terms of equipment, we're using Symbol (now Motorola) WS5100 Wireless Switches with Symbol AP300 Access Ports. The 'A' radios are switched off and the B/G radios are using a combination of channels 1, 6 and 11 to provide coverage from non-overlapping channels.

As a number of other people have also experienced on their sites, the Apple devices appear to be the only ones experiencing an issue with this configuration.

Unfortunately as Apple don't provide any sort of interface to manage saved WLAN configs on either the Phone or the Touch, it can be difficult to track the where the problem is coming from.

Dear all,

Just want to tell you my experience as it may be usefull to some of you. I recently acquired my iPod Touch 64GB and connected it to my wifi network (WPA2 protected - visible SSID) without any problems. Last week I needed (reasons don't matter here) to hide this SSID and indeed experienced the same problems as many others here : every time that I activated my iPod, I had to enter SSID, protection mode and password all over again. One of the earlier posts in this topic explained that his problems were solved by resetting the network settings (Reset network settings.
Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings.)
And yes ! This solved the issue for me too. I don't have to enter my SSID anymore after waking up my iPod.
Hope this helps for others too.
BR

Just wanted to confirm my experience that while the clear-and-reenter method does seem to work, it would seem that it has has to be done after every OS update. I bought my device with 3.0, and have had to nuke and re-enter all networks every time I have upgraded the OS.

Fascinating discussion of screen dimming frequency setting up some sort of harmonic that might (somehow) interfere with wifi, here on TidBits: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/11274#comments>

Gotta be something strange and obscure like that - sure is annoying when it happens tho 😉 I'll be changing my screen brightness in just a moment.....