Q: WiFi Issues With MacBook Air

(The suggestions in that post have not worked for me, btw. I tried them many weeks ago.)

So, today, at home and trying to use my MBA - see my previous posts on this thread for minute documentation of what I've experienced and attempted - and my network speeds were absolutely choked to the point of being unusable.  Given that no one else was around and/or connected to the network, I decided to pursue one of my theories - that the combination of the MBA hardware + Lion + secured networks - were at the root of my problems.

I used Airport Utility to turn off the WPA2Personal wifi security on my Airport Express and waited for the reboot.  I had experienced constant problems for hours today, despite restarts, turning Airport off and on multiple times, zapping PRAM, etc.  It wasn't until I turned off the Wifi security that I was suddenly up and running at normal speeds.  And here I am.

I am documenting this and all problems with MacBook Air wifi and networking issues on Twitter at #mbawififail and urge you to do the same. 

Are you experiencing networking problems of the kind documented on this thread?

Are you on a secured network?

Have you tried turning the security off, and testing, if you are able to?

Please report back.

...and I imagine it goes without saying that running around with my home network unsecured is not a viable "solution" to this problem, any more than running with no Bluetooth, etc., has been.

All my issues started when I upgraded to Lion.

You got it right - choked to the point of being unusable.

I am an engineer and tried everything systematically via setups, configs, bands, channels, passwords, DNS's etc  with Airport Utility. It was a hige matrix.  I spent weeks on it and many, many hours and was amazingly frustrated with Apple's lack of serious help. Had 2 session at the Genius bar. 'Interfernce' was the mantra.

After every change, I ran speedtest.net. Every once in a while I would get a 'clear path' but it would not last.

then I found Kelly's post and gave it a try. I couldn't believe it worked. So far so good. Password protection works fine. Very simple home network : Airport Extreme 5th gen and MBA-13/256/4GB, 1 MBP and iMac. It is as if I had not upgraded to lion - like when I first got the MBA in April. Fingers are crossed till/if Apple comes up with a real fix. MBPand iMac never had a problem. 

Briller

Sorry briller, which one is kelly's post (I can't find any kelly username...)?

Sorry- It was not Steve Kelley- his fix was different and I was not comfortable trying it.

http://younixgeek.blogspot.com/2011/08/issues-with-2011-macbook-air-dropping.htm l

Here is one I did and it worked:

http://thoughts.maayank.com/2011/08/wireless-problems-with-macbook-air-and.html.

It in effective downgrades the Broadcom wifi drivers.

Briller

The maayank solution is, so far, BRILLIANT. Many hearty THANKS to YOU for bringing this to our attention! You are a good soul for supporting this thread as you have so far.

M

I too am having problems connecting to a WPA2 network, while open access points without authentication are accessible. I'm using a mid-2011 MBA 13" with a 1.7 GHz i5

Ok...

it seems reasonable (a driver problem).

Just a question: is it reversible?

What about if in the next lion update they fix it? It is going to overwrite the driver?

I also have the same issue. I am windows user and bought this just to have a change. But now fedup with wireless issue in MBA 13 2011 version.

Hi All,

Just wanted to add that I've done the kext swap mentioned earlier and this does NOT work for me.  I had tried it when it was first posted in early august, and again earlier this week after 10.7.1 and both times i still had frequent drops. 

Also, super horrible news!  My house was broken into and my air was stolen yesterday... SO that's pretty fun. Waiting to hear from insurance and all that fun stuff. 

Hope this issue is resolved by the time I get a replacement.

Thanks,

matt

That is horrible news and I'm sorry to hear it! Thank you for reporting in about the kext swap not working for you, either; I've also tried it twice. No dice.

#mbawififail on Twitter.

only a thought- when the next Lion update comes out, have them do it at the Genius bar.

Briller

That's a bummer, ubiquity.

I am sad to say this has more the sense of a casino that the world's largest technology company. I have my fingers crossed till there's a fix.

After wifi working for several weeks with no problems, it now does not work at all again -- call scheduled with Apple Care Monday.  I have forwarded several of the "fixes" to my contact there for his input and will let all  know if anything works.  At last resort I will need to connect directly -- which defeats the entire portability purpose for buying this particular computer in the first place.  Once again I get the "timeout" response when I try to connect. 

OK Guys!

After having these same problems:

My WIFI connection at home was disconnected EVERY time I woke my MacBook Air Mid 2011 13" up from sleep. It simply wouldn't find my 5 GHZ wifi. So I thought, let me try to connect it to my 2.4GHZ WIFI (Telekom 921V 2-channel router) and it worked once, but then displayed the same behavior on the 2.4GHZ channel and kept not wanting to find my preferred home WLAN after sleep or even after turning WIFI off and then on.

Then I read a thread here that said something about the bluetooth/wifi connection, so I shut off my bluetooth on my MBA and wallah! It works, stays connected and finds the network after sleep. I've reproduced this now 4 times. Every time I turn bluetooth on, the macbook will simply not connect to my WIFI. When I turn bluetooth off, it connects in a couple of seconds and reconnects in a couple of seconds after waking up from sleep.

Try this and I hope it works for you (it's obviously not and end-all solution, but if you're not using any bluetooth devices at least you might have a solid wlan connection.)