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tor_b Author

Level 1

30 points

Wifi connection dropping randomly

I received my macbook pro M1 in December, and it has been working fine. But yesterday suddenly it started dropping the wifi connection at random. The connection is usually dropped 2-5 times in a row over a period of a few minutes, and then it stabilizes for some time before doing it again.

When the connection is lost, the wifi icon flashes (searching for signal), and then mostly the connection reestablishes itself. But sometimes I have to turn off wifi and then turn it on again, for it to reconnect.

The household has a couple of windows laptops, and they have no problems with the connection. And, like I said, my macbook hasn't had any problems until yesterday, but now it keeps returning.

I ran a wireless diagnostics monitoring, and it registered the dropped connection, but I don't have enough technical knowledge to know where to look and what to look for in the diagnostics report files.

Any ideas?

Posted on Jan 2, 2021 8:49 AM

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tor_b Author

Level 1

30 points

Posted on Jan 7, 2021 9:40 AM

I ran through the steps in the article, but none of that does anything.

The weird thing is, like I said, it worked fine for a couple of weeks and then suddenly it got unstable. I'm using my macbook in the same places as I did all the time, so nothing should be changed regarding interference etc. Also, none of our other devices have any trouble staying connected.

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tor_b Author

Level 1

30 points

Jan 8, 2021 9:40 AM in response to SgtSteve21

I was on the phone with a senior apple advisor for the second time today, and he told me to try and switch to the 5GHz network. My ISP-provided router has three signals, one 2.4GHz, one 5GHz and one without a specified frequency. My ISP originally told me to connect to the last one, as devices should then be able to switch to the best match themselves.

After I got home I switched to 5GHz, and my connection has been stable since. Not totally sure yet, as there has been some prolonged stable periods before, but like you said, it looks promising so far.

I've read a lot of posts on different forums stating, that people have had wifi troubles since Big Sur, so in my opinion all signs point towards a bug somewhere in the OS. It's fine if this continues to work, but it should definitely be patched in a near future update. It seems a little odd, that a brand new Macbook Pro shouldn't be able to handle the switching itself in a stable way, when a 5+ years old Windows laptop can.

Jan 8, 2021 9:46 AM in response to tor_b

glad to hear that man. let's hope it stays stable! i believe the 2.4ghz one should work fine too as it was working fine for me yesterday but I've just been using the 5ghz one for now.

it definitely shouldn't be doing this like you said as it is the latest technology but it must be a bug in the OS that is somehow making the systems switch between frequencies and as a result dropping the signals.

as annoying as it is, i'm kind of glad that's all it is (if it is indeed that) and not something more serious. let me know if you find anything else out or if it ends up dropping again. so far so good on my end.

Jan 8, 2021 9:49 AM in response to tor_b

Problem is on all my iPhones, iPad and MBP, so it's wider than MacOS. Did the engineer explain to you what root cause all of this fixes. It just sounds like Tech Support telling people to change a load of settings without explaining what change has caused the observed problems

Jan 8, 2021 9:54 AM in response to paulfromwinchester

if it's on all your devices then that is a different problem. not what we are experiencing.

that sounds like a router problem that you should contact your ISP about. I wouldn't recommend changing the settings for that. I understand it was working a few weeks ago but things can change, routers can become faulty.

Jan 7, 2021 10:12 AM in response to tor_b

One item that has not been mentioned, but is very important:

How crowded is your "Network neighborhood"? How many other Routers can you see from this Mac?

tor_b Author

Level 1

30 points

Jan 7, 2021 10:34 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Around five others.

Why would that matter?

Jan 7, 2021 10:49 AM in response to tor_b

yeah it shouldn’t matter I don’t think. if all the other devices are working fine there’s no reason a newer macbook shouldn’t

tor_b Author

Level 1

30 points

Jan 7, 2021 11:35 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Huh, I didn't know that.

But wouldn't this mean, that all devices using the wifi would experience the same problems?

Jan 7, 2021 5:12 PM in response to cp from OH

any further help if this doesn’t work? could you read the last few msgs from this thread?

Jan 8, 2021 6:54 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

But why is this a factor given that most people will state, as I will, that up to a couple of weeks ago, the network was very stable?

Jan 8, 2021 7:05 AM in response to SgtSteve21

Do you use your ISP router to provide wifi, or another router cabled to the ISP's device? I use the airport only for wifi

Wifi connection dropping randomly