Wifi Constantly Dropping in Lion

iOS might handle networking differently.

Message was edited by: Carlo TD

105 pages of posts from Apple customers that can't use their Macs to do something as simple as use the wireless internet connection. Meanwhile Apple is bragging about the iPad 3 breaking sales records... W-T-F. It's coming up on a year now and we still can't get any work done online! Hey TIM COOK, have you any idea how annoying being disconnected 50MB shy of a 1GB download is?!

How about putting down your iToys and re-allocating some resources to your OS! I remember when Apple actually cared about computers and not how many iGadgets they can pump out. For the last 25 years I used nothing but Macs... even through the dark years I was a Mac faithful when everyone thought I was crazy. Now that everyone and their dog seems to have jumped onto the Apple bandwagon, I find myself more and more disgusted. The way this company has transformed into a gloried accessory company makes me sick. OS X Lion is frankly a joke. Spinning beach balls every 5 mins, randomly disconnecting WIFI, Safari pages constantly reloading all at once, etc... and what's with the hidden folders that are hidden for no good reason? Is that like the soft, plastic cutlery the ret@rded kid gets at meals so he doesnt hurt himself? Are we the ret@rded kid, Apple?!

And don't expect it to get any better. Tim Cook has said that the PC era is over. He wants to replace our Macs with iPads. I'll give you my Mac when you pry it from my cold, dead hands... it will be using an ethernet cable mind you.

My sentiments exactly, Pax Webb1! I think I'm just going to have to keep what old Apple hardware I have as-is until it dies. Even iTunes is buggy, and instead of fixing the bugs, Apple keeps releasing new features to sell more things to the masses (and of course, many of those contain silly, fixable bugs that never get fixed too).

Apple's fast moving from being about quality products, to being about flashy designs with flashy feature updates once or twice a year to keep to their release cycles and keep the analysts happy. Expensive hardware that looks nice but doesn't actually work very well anymore, and sacrificing quality for excessive profits when they've got so much cash in the bank....what a shame. Too bad that Steve Jobs didn't have an equally quality-obessed protegé in the pipeline that could take the helm.

I'll tell you the truth...if my air port stays connected long enough...but something is seriously wrong because the WiFi isn't the only problem I've had to deal with. The stock X11 stuff has been a nightmare for me too.

It would crash and then just keep restarting until I could manage to log out and log back in. Finally, I replaced the X11 with the one from the X org foundation site and things couldn't be any better. I have a BRAND NEW iMac 27" with Lion pre-installed.

You, said it , sgt_harris, too many new features without thinking about the old, proven, needed ones.

I did find it funny however that about a couple of weeks ago, there was an update that was specifically for the

WiFi drops. As soon as I installed it, my connection dropped. So, I rebooted, and BAM! it came up and stayed connected for a whole whopping 27 minutes!

Nothing beats ye old ethernet cable running across the floor to trip on and almost yank a $1700.00 piece of equipment off your desk. 😉

I just ended months of trying to help Apple out debugging my problem. wiping my hard drive (3 times). starting fresh, sending data files each step of the way. My wifi didn't work when I updated the first time to Lion. Or after wiping my hard drive clean and installing Lion fresh without installing any other software. Didn't work after restoring my system with Time Machine. After 6 months of back and forth with Apple, they told me I would have to pay for a repair. I took it to Apple store locally and they tested my wifi card and said it was working fine. I bought a new router and still did not fix the problem. My wife's macbook Air has work fine throughout this whole ordeal. In the end, after spending many months (since last summer some time), Apple still beileves this problem is due to bad wifi hardware which the apple store says is fine. Apple will replace it for $150 plus shipping (normally $300). In my mind, if it is due to an imcompatibility between Lion and this device, then I will have spent $150 more dollars to no avail. Apple offered 10% discount and $100 off the purchase of a new laptop. I've spent a total of somewhere between 50 to 70 hours on the phone and running tests and a whole day at the Apple Store in an effort to solve this problem just to find myself in the same place as before. I asked the support person at Apple wether the engineers said anything about this problem and she said no. They apparantly have no knowledge of any large numbers of wifi problems. I kept directing her to this discussion forum since they seem totally unaware or the issue or won't openly say anything about it. I will say they were very persistent in getting in touch with me. It just seems like there is some disconnect between the support people and enginerring staff, not to mention the customers with regards to this issue. I really wish Apple had offered to fix this at no cost considering the circumstance but they didn't. I just wish there was some clarity about what is going on. I can't for the life of me understand why Apple can't come out with a fix. I realize that perhaps not everyone is experiencing the same issue, but it sure does seem like most of us only started having this issue with Lion which suggests it may have something to do with it.

Hi everybody,

I bought my MBA on September (already pre-installed Lion). Since then, I don't know how many times I've been to the Apple Store here in Madrid. The solution to this issue has always been the same: chenge it for a new one. As you can imagine, the problem is not in the hardware itself, but something related to the cat... Getting a new computer is OK but not the proper solution to a problem that they are not interested in sorting out (or don't know).

Having this problem is awesome in the 21st century. So I'm not willing to go to the Apple Store more times.

Do you know how it's possible to get the money back? Right now, it's the only thing I want. To get a computer, slower, thinner and plastic but with the possibility to stay one day without dropping Internet.

Thanks ahead. Good luck!!!!!!

Good question. I'm also worried about what to do if this problem doesn't go away! I bought my computer the same time as you got yours.

gkillmaster wrote:

.... I asked the support person at Apple wether the engineers said anything about this problem and she said no. They apparantly have no knowledge of any large numbers of wifi problems. I kept directing her to this discussion forum since they seem totally unaware or the issue or won't openly say anything about it.

Someone else saying the same as I did.... I got shot down in flames by pedantic fanboys for suggesting any such thing, but the evidence is mounting.

To be sincere, I am not a customer accustomed to buy things and returning later but I don't find any different solution to get the money and buy what you had to have bought at first.

If somebody can shed light on this issue, I would be glad yo hear it. In the Spanish website I found this, but I am not sure it applies to this case:

http://www.apple.com/legal/sales_policies/retail_es.html

The English version of that page says you have 2 weeks to make a return. I don't see anything about the case of a defective product. There are additional legal rights for people in Spain, though I haven't read the document (top link, see below). France and Quebec also have additional rights provisions accessible from the same page.

http://www.apple.com/legal/warranty/Additional_Legal_Rights_for_Consumers.html

Thanks for raising this point. Reading the computer warranty, it looks like for the rest of us (or all of us if these extra provisions don't help you) it's down to what the OSX Lion warranty says.

I have a MBP as well that constantly drops. My only conclusion is that after all this time and hundreds of thousands of complaints 1) Apple knows it is broke. 2) Apple isn't going to fix it.

The only reason for Apple to fix it is that it affected their public image like Antenna Gate. If this issue is transparent for future new customers, nothing is going to be solved.

At least, Apple can be sure this has been the last euro I've spent in an Apple product. Let's see how long the prosperity in Apple's world lasts. Acting this way, not too much.

I see very, very, few people here telling us what wireless router they are using....

Why not give us all the information about the wireless equipment you have?

Whether it used to work on not with previous versions....

If you don't give us anymore information, not too many people can help you.

Complaints don't help get your problem solved...

I have an Airport Extreme and several computers running Lion with all the current updates...

I had a few minor problems with Wi-Fi but they seemed to have straightened themselves out...

No one is going to read 106 pages of complaints.

And, no one here can help you with your complaints.....

Joseph,

Good point. I am using an Airport Extreme as my AP. It is the same one that I have been using for about 3 years.

Here's some other information, I might be jumping the gun, but, it appears now that my wireless is staying connected. It has been up for 5 hours straight now. The difference?? Well, I took an old wireless b/g AP and created another WLAN and connected to it. I still have my Airport Extreme (non dual band in 'n' mode, serviing

my other devices, but added the addition b/g AP to my network.

So, is there something awry with the iMac 'n' mode support?

I'm using Linksys WRT120N with Mac mini and another 4 laptops running Win7.

I'm running mixed mode (b/g + N) only because by Blackberry cannot connect N - but all the computers connect in N mode.

The problem started ONLY after upgrading to 10.7. None of the Win7 machines fail.