Wifi Constantly Dropping in Lion

I was having the same issue - every five minutes or so my wifi would drop for a couple of minutes. There are too many suggestions and fixes bouncing around so I decided to wait for something official from Apple. I did, however, download and run Onyx for Lion. I ran it in automation mode and haven't had the issue since (it's been a day).

I'm not saying this will work for you but it worked for me.

i dl onyX and so far so good. of course now i just jinxed myself. we'll see. thanks

Same problem---WiFi shows connected but is not. I called apple support and they took me through the power reset and pram zap, seemed to work but now the same symptoms are appearing. The only thing that seems to consistently fix it is to power cycle the dsl modem.

Spent nearly an hour on the phone today with an Apple tech. Bottom line, he believes, is this: if your router is working with 64 bit encryption (WEP protected), connection will be spotty; the newer OS's are too sensitive to work consistently with that. Since I was connected to a Verizon FIOS router that is WEP, he thinks that's my problem. I have an Apple Time Capsule, which we connected to my router and am now using that for my network instead of the Verizon setup. Since it's WPA2 Personal he thinks it will solve the problem. I'd been dropping every 15 minutes or so; haven't dropped in the three hours since getting off the phone. I hope this is the solution for me and hope this information helps all of you having similar problems. If not, I'll be back!

>Since it's WPA2 Personal he thinks it will solve the problem.

All of these Apple support guys have no clue. I have WPA2 personal, and my mac air can only connect to G, not N wireless.

Apple *broke* wireless in Lion. Workarounds and tech support etc. etc. are not going to fix the problem. The wireless guys who broke this in Lion need to fix it, then roll out the fix.

I am using a Airport Express with WPA2 security and am having the dropping problem.

Have you guys tried the fix I used and has my wireless running at 20Mbps.

Simple. Take your wifi router and plug your computer directly in. Turn off Airport. Open a webpage. Run a speed test (I used www.Speakeasy.net/Speedtest). After you get the results turn your Airport on. Unplug the Cat 5 running to the router. Open www.Speakeasy.net/Speedtest and test your connection. From that point on you shoud have no problem. Since I've done that my Macbook Pro has been running with Lion REDICULOUSLY fast!

Good luck. And if this solves your problem please click that I helped. I appreciate it! Hope it works for you too!

Quite likely that you're right. I have a case # and the extension of the guy who helped me, so if/when I have the problem again you can bet I'll be on the phone again. Apple needs to hear directly from us as tech support falls through. Lesson learned: never ever DL a new OS the first couple of weeks it's out!

rjvaughn,

Is your Base Station configured for WPA2/WPA Personal ? Basically your Mac won't do 11n with WPA/TKIP.

It has to be complete WPA2 or it has to be Open.

Also there are a lot of draft 11n router's out in the market that haven't got updated and this could cause issue's when client makers conform more to the spec. Try checking on the security setting to see if it fixes your issue. IF not, test and see if Open works.

My wifi is working now. Got an IT specialist round (my cousin) to look at it. Went to system preferences, then Network, changed the location from Automatic to Home.

Fairly simple, but Snow Leopard was trouble free and in all fairness Lion should be as well.

All very well Lion looking all flash and trying to be like the os on your iphone, but really the basics should have be tested and 100% fine before this release.

😟

Well I continue to have the same issue as well. I tinkered with the network settings, locations for hours. Finally what made it more stable was adding 8.8.8.8 (google's dns) to the settings. It stil dtops periodically.

Like you said, this worked perfectly in snow leopard. Now it's broken. I've done this too many times in my lifetime. I should have stuck with what works.

Apple needs to fix this.

Same here. Its normally stable but drops out without warning. I'm alittle far from the router but still have almost full signal.

I'm just on Safari when Wi-Fi would just lose connection then reconnect. I have yet to play games or talk on Skype but I'm not expecting a stable connection. It was working fine on Snow Leapard yesterday so must be Lion's problem.

I'm on a Mid 2010 iMac.

This pops up quite alot on Console:

AirPort: Link Down on en1. Reason 16 (Group Key Handshake timeout).

just installed Lion, but the wifi lose connection every 15 - 20 sec. Using snow leopard the wifi was fine.

Now the router is g only and it seems that the disconnection problem is fixed.

bye

i m sorry, but now the wifi disconnection is back. So the solution is not the wifi-g mode in the router.

wifiguru, My router is set to wpa2. I'm really not going to do a bunch of debugging and changing wireless settings, since that will not lead to a solution. Everything worked flawlessly in before my Lion upgrade, and is broken in Lion. The only thing that changed is Lion, and Lion has broken wireless (over N) for my mac air. This is not a "draft N" router, I bought it just a few months ago.

I've submitted a bug to apple. I don't think there is anything any of us can do but wait for them to fix the problem. I work in the industry. From 50,000 feet, is obvious Apple broke this code, they don't have an immediate fix or workaround, and their tech support doesn't have a clue. Tech support can help you if you've configured something wrong. They can't help you if Apple broke the underlying code.