Updated to 10.7.3. Wifi drops constantly.

Updated this morning. Then it would not hold a wifi connection for more than 5 seconds at a time. Had to use Lion Recovery to install a Time Machine backup to 10.7.2. That took over two hours. After that wifi was semi-ok. Lion has always had a problem with wifi. I am very disappointed with how Apple has handled the Lion rollout. So many problems. I would suggest anyone having problems with wifi think twice before installing this update.

iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.2)

Posted on Feb 2, 2012 5:35 AM

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143 replies

Feb 7, 2012 12:39 PM in response to kate152

Airport connection hasd similar bugs prior to 10.7.2, somewhat corrected in 10.7.1 as compared to 10.7.0, but all seem OK in 10.7.3. I wonder why it is worse there.

Are there apps starting up at login? Can you uncheck their automatic start-up?

Or, simply create a new user, log out and log in into new user. do you experience the same problem? or just in the current account?

Feb 8, 2012 5:25 AM in response to billg310

I have updated my iMac, late 2011, to the recent 10.7.3 via Software Update. Everything went well for a week or so, until yesterday, when my Wi-Fi connection kept saying Alert: No internet connection. Everything was going well on my iPhone.

Sometimes a turn off and on of the airport interface would do it, sometimes a diagnostic would do it, and sometimes a reboot of the router did the trick. I have set a static ip and the google public dns address in my wi-fi connection settings and it works flawlessly now. However, if I put it DHCP again, the connection breaks after getting out from sleep, and neither my iMac nor my iPhone can get an IP.


I don't know who's broken now. The iMac, even if it worked good for a week, or my router. Or there is some kind of a handshake problem and my router goes mad after it can't solve the problems with the iMac.

I have over-installed the Combo update, but it did not solve anything.


If anyone has an ideea, I would appreciate it.

Feb 8, 2012 5:42 AM in response to devianc3

This is an issue with the 10.7.3 update. There are a ton of threads about the issue, with most people not having had any problems prior to the 10.7.3 update, and with many different types of routers. Speaking for myself I have had no change in my local environment equipment/people or otherwise, other than installing the 10.7.3 update. immediately after that my imac developed the no network problem after sleep. Well there was an update for my Apple Extreme router recently also, but people are complaining of the same symptoms with other brand of routers also.

Feb 8, 2012 6:12 AM in response to amcl71

The thing is that even for a week after the update, for me, it still worked. And I'm guessing that the misunderstandings between the iMac and the router makes it for other devices to be unable to connect to the router until a restart. I was even thinking of flashing dd-wrt to my router, because I just don't understand what has changed after a week of everything going fine.

Feb 8, 2012 9:24 AM in response to billg310

I was having the same problem with my mid-2011 iMac. I tried everything: delete all the network settings, reinstall the combo update, reinstall Lion from a fresh 10.7.3 DVD, and nothing helped. Then I tried resetting the SMC and zapping the PRAM and I haven't had trouble since. Not sure which one of those fixed it, or if it was a combo of things, but it's reconnected every time since then.

Feb 12, 2012 7:09 AM in response to billg310

There definately is a bug in the WiFi-implementation in OSX 10.7.3.

My Mac mini with Atheros 9280 AirPort-card that was working without any problems in OSX 10.7.2 and even had the AirDrop-option, gave a "WiFi: no hardware installed" error after upgrading to 10.7.3...


I've spent a lot of time trying to get things right and did try all options supplied everywhere (repairing permissions, zapping PRAM, replacing the .kext from TimeMachine, manually reinstalling the 10.7.3 Combo update, etc. etc.)

nothing helped... or other options (like reinstalling OSX or downgrading & upgrading OSX) seemed to work properly on first installment, but got me back into the same error after the first restart of my Mac (and after every restart ever since)


...until I noticed that one thing was really odd : when starting up in 'Rescue Mode' (pressing Apple(CMD)+R during startup) I noticed that then my WiFi was 'magically ressurected' ; the AirPort-card was recognised and automatically reconnected to my AirPort/WiFi-network...


I've found only one way to fix this :

1- download the Kext Utility here : http://cvad-mac.narod2.ru/Kext_Utility

2- then… reinstall the IO8211Family.kext from 10.6 Snow Leopard and reboot (get it from a 10.6 install DVD)

3- and only after that... you will be able to successfully reinstall the IO8211Family.kext from 10.7.2 (get it from your TimeMachine backup) [this last step is only needed if you want the AirDrop-option back]


The odd thing is that the IO8211Family.kext from 10.7.2 seems to be exactly the same as the one from 10.7.3 since they have exactly the same version number (4.1.2) and creation and modification dates...

...and directly installing the IO8211Family.kext from 10.7.2 onto 10.7.3 doesn't work either...


The only difference I've noticed is that the firmware is now “Atheros 9280: 4.0.61.4-P2P” under OSX 10.7.3

but it used to be “Atehros 9280: 4.0.58.4-P2P” under OSX 10.7.2...


That could be the source of this problem…

Could it be that the 10.7.3-installer updated the Atheros 9280′s firmware, but that 10.7.3 itself isn’t compatible with the new firmware ???

Please Apple - get this fixed a.s.a.p. - it's not acceptable that there is a "WiFi: no hardware installed" error on Mac with a fully functioning original AirPort-card...

Feb 12, 2012 7:41 AM in response to newdeal99

I've had a similar problem on 2 iMacs -- one 2010, one 2011 -- both using the 10.7.3 of Lion. My problem was losing wireless connection after a few minutes away (after sleep). I had to go in and manually start up again. I tried all (almost all) of the suggested fixes with nothing making any difference. Tried changing sleep settings, but unless it was set to NEVER -- it didn't work. I didn't want it set to never.

Finally, I fixed it by changing my wireless Apple mouse for an older USB connected mouse. Voila !. No problems anymore!

On both Macs I have all default settings with 10.7.3 and a Trackpad AND USB mouse connected. On the 2010 MAC, I haven't had any problems for months. On the 2011 iMac it fixed it for at least the last 2 days (all I've tried).

Good luck.

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Updated to 10.7.3. Wifi drops constantly.

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