Q: Lion WiFi Connection Problem

Agreed, I gave-up, none of the update or fix works for me...

RichBP, would you be willing to test the hypothesis and change your connection mode to G (either on the router or on the wifi device in the mac)?  I am in no way suggesting that this is a sustainable solution, but it might help to narrow down the cause of the problem.  If it makes no change, as in Eric491's case, then at least you know the problem is not related to connection mode [are any of your other wifi devices, presumably all of which are working fine, connected with mode N?].

Hello, I know maybe you and many here have tried this already, but since it worked for me (and many more) and this forum has so many post, then for those who do not know, try this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=US&v=TtxRfFAh8Pg

pbarnes@internode.on.net wrote:

 

Carlo, what is a sign that I have too many devices connected? And are you suggesting I get an N router when many here are telling us that their Lion bad wifi problem is solved when they turn off N?

That is correct... I am suggesting to you that you get an N router that also has a 5 Ghrz Band including the 2.4Ghrz Band. Most cordless telephones, microwaves, and some electronics interferes with thing in the 900Mhrtz throught the 2.4Ghrz range. That is why if a person buys a cordless phone the majority of them are in the 5 Ghrtz range. The G band routers are rock solid, however they are right at the edge of that 2.4 Ghrz range which either must accept or indirectly causes interference for other devices (900 Mhrtz-2.4Ghrtz range). If you are on a budget, and you dont watch youtube and use it to check your email, a G router is fine... but if you start having a lot of devices (more than 5) using that band... and you dont even have to be using it... your neighbor across the street could be using it also, then your going to feel it, and a N router is what you need. Also, are all G routers able to handle IPv4 in addition to IPv6? I do not know. However N routers are backward compatible. Here is an article. The only thing in the article the author refers to Apple routers as Airport Express... and Apple routers fall under a category of either Time Capsules, Airport Extremes, and Airport Expresses. I believe this author ment to use the word Airport Extreme becaue Airport Extreme is what Apple use to call their wireless cards inside computers, as well as their routers. So I guess technically Apple Routers fall under the umbrella term of "Airport Extremes." I would also suggest you either get an Apple Extreme or (only if you could afford) a Time Capsule. I have both, and I bought both off second hand. My choice would be the Airport Extreme. But to each his own. Oh... here is the article. In a few years (or if one breaks sooner), I will upgrade my routers to something newer - most likely an Apple router because I have set up so many routers and by far the Apple Routers are the simplest.

Message was edited by: Carlo TD

Oxygen70 wrote:

 

Hello, I know maybe you and many here have tried this already, but since it worked for me (and many more) and this forum has so many post, then for those who do not know, try this:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=US&v=TtxRfFAh8Pg

The video shows how to downgrade the wifi driver version back to the one in Snow Leopard.  I reckon this has a high likelihood of fixing some of the issues many people have been having.

calebfromqld wrote:

 

The video shows how to downgrade the wifi driver version back to the one in Snow Leopard.  I reckon this has a high likelihood of fixing some of the issues many people have been having.

It also has a high probability of causing strange system errors and a 100% probability of causing difficulties when performing future upgrades.

Use major caution when performing such a dangerous operation and know that when future updates are released a clean reinstall may be required.

Now that you point that out, let me tell you from my experience that I did the downgrade maybe 4 months ago or later, also did the lion upgrade a couple of weeks ago and all I can tell you is that my iMac works like a charm with wifi connection. I think that maybe if the situation that you exposed here wold had happend to many people, Mr. Rys had post it in his youtube comments of the video.

p.s. When I did Lion upgrade I had to do the downgrade process again.

Oxygen70 wrote:

 

p.s. When I did Lion upgrade I had to do the downgrade process again.

Just for interest sake, could you confirm the wifi mode before and after downgrade, i.e. was it mode N both times? And in the 5 GHz range, or the 2.4 GHz range?  It is unlikely you made a note of it, but I just want to check whether there was any connection/mode change as a consequence of the driver changeout.  Even after the downgrade, are you connected in mode N or G?  [Finder > Applications > Utilities > System Info > Network > Wifi]

Oxygen70 wrote:

I think that maybe if the situation that you exposed here wold had happend to many people, Mr. Rys had post it in his youtube comments of the video.

 

p.s. When I did Lion upgrade I had to do the downgrade process again.

If you watch the boards whenever an update is released you'll see a lot of "My Wi-Fi doesn't work at all after this update" messages, many of which are tracked back to the fact that they hacked their Wi-Fi in this manner.

Sorry but I'm not a computer expert. I followed the rout you gave to network - wifi, but cant see anything that says something about N or G neither about GHz range.

Oxygen70 wrote:

 

Sorry but I'm not a computer expert. I followed the rout you gave to network - wifi, but cant see anything that says something about N or G neither about GHz range.

Ok, no worries.

calebfromqld wrote:

 

Oxygen70 wrote:

 

Sorry but I'm not a computer expert. I followed the rout you gave to network - wifi, but cant see anything that says something about N or G neither about GHz range.

 

Ok, no worries.

  Software Versions:

  CoreWLAN:          2.1.2 (212.1)

  CoreWLANKit:          1.0.2 (102.2)

  Menu Extra:          7.0.2 (702.1)

  configd plug-in:          7.1.2 (712.1)

  System Profiler:          7.0 (700.3)

  IO80211 Family:          4.1.2 (412.2)

  WiFi Diagnostics:          1.0.1 (101.1)

  AirPort Utility:          6.0 (600.92)

  Interfaces:

en1:

  Card Type:          AirPort Extreme  (0x14E4, 0x8D)

  Firmware Version:          Broadcom BCM43xx 1.0 (5.100.98.75.19)

  MAC Address:          00:23:6c:9a:14:ec

  Locale:          FCC

  Country Code:          X0

  Supported PHY Modes:          802.11 a/b/g/n

  Supported Channels:          1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 36, 40, 44, 48, 52, 56, 60, 64, 100, 104, 108, 112, 116, 120, 124, 128, 132, 136, 140, 149, 153, 157, 161, 165

  Wake On Wireless:          Supported

  AirDrop:          Supported

  Status:          Connected

This information about the current network shows 802.11n, and the channel indicates a non-2.4Ghz.

Channels 0-14 are 2.4Ghz.  Anything above is 3, 4 or 5GHz depending on country.

  Current Network Information:

ALDGTLNK5:

  PHY Mode:          802.11n

  BSSID:          00:15:6d:de:fe:f9

  Channel:          149

  Country Code:          X0

  Network Type:          Infrastructure

  Security:          None

  Signal / Noise:          -86 dBm / -91 dBm

  Transmit Rate:          7

  MCS Index:          0

Many thanks for this.

I was reading some comments on Amazon at

<http://www.amazon.com/forum/networking/ref=cm_cd_ecf_tft_tp?_encoding=UTF8&cdFor um=FxKP7DES2R7EE8&cdThread=Tx6F39DLIHT984>

which included the following text:

i currently have a linksys wrt54g router, im using it wireless for a ipod touch, netbook, and apple tv. i recently got a ps3 and everytime i turn it on i seem to lose wifi on all of the other devices except for the ps3 have to do a reboot on the router to be able to connect again. any suggestions on what i can try to avoid losing my connection??

This indicates that there might be particular kinds of devices that create problems with older or more limited routers, in terms of crossing boundries of the total number of devices which the router can support.

Some people are having success in buying a new router, and this might be the reason why that works for them.

I didn't read through this entire thread, so forgive me if this has been mentioned before:

I've made a very interesting discovery this morning while troubleshooting this issue. I was testing ping response times of a 2011 MacBook Air that came with Lion pre-installed from my workstation. The ping response times were all over the place, anywhere from 20-200 ms! I have been trying all of the different suggestions that people have provided and checking the ping times. No change. I said to myself, I might as well run Software Update to make sure I have everything, and sure enough when I fired up Software Update on my MBA, the ping response times dropped down instantly to >1 ms. I was thinking to myself, what did I do differently? I couldn't think of anything except for SWUD, so I stopped it, and immediately my ping reponses went back up and where all over the place. I resumed SWUD and they dropped back down. Freaking bizzarre I know!!! I have also tested it with simply pinging an apple site (swcdn.apple.com, support.apple.com) from the client and that seems to help as well. I've heard of people suggesting pinging facebook.com or google, but that didn't work for me, only the apple sites did.

I will continue testing today and keep an eye on things, but I just wanted to share with you all!