Mac Pro Constantly Losing Wireless Connectivity

There are two sides to WiFi communication:

Sending signals

Receiving signals

Both are required to be good for success.

The point I was trying to make was that if your neighbors can broadcast signals to your MacPro better from 15-25 feet further away, it calls you Router's Transmit capability (specifically for communicating with your Mac Pro) into question. If your house is solid masonry construction like mine, Router and computer placement are non-trivial issues.

Your Mac Pro has been tuned up to communicate using the latest technology. It may have a better receiver for split band or Hi-band WiFi. Your PC may be better at low-band.

Belkin has no long-term commitment to Routers -- thay make more cables and converters than anything else.

Apple is testing against the latest standards in WiFi. There is plenty of equipment out there that does not adhere to the latest standards.

I went through a modem+router+wifi to separate modem and two different wifi routers and the difference in the newest Netgear over the older models (all Netgear too) were significant, plus the wizard setup is so much better along with latest wifi push to establish my wifi connections.

And, it fitlers/blocks out the 5-6 other wifi routers around me.

Hello,

I am curious if you ever found a way to resolve the problem. I need a solution for it as well.

Background: I have had several macbook pros and every single one had this problem... but I am trying to use OS X as my main OS instead of a practice OS and this problem has become a huge glaring issue for me. Here is what I have discovered so far:

The issue is in the power management of wireless chipset. The chipset keeps reducing TX power until it loses sync with the router. You can see it in action if you have another card to watch from.

There is no way to turn off the power management of the wireless (which solves the problem nicely in Linux).

This issue has been around for a VERY long time and there are NO actual answers given. This does not affect everyone. All of my computers have been affected and one of my friends has the same problem. I know several people who are NOT affected. This only seems to affect the higher-end models.

Apple has to know about this... so why are there no answers given? Why are the discussions about it lacking in any quality answers? Let's be paranoid and assume that Apple is somehow making money out of this...

Regardless, the high end Apple products are not fit for use and I will personally never buy another one. This situation is absolutely disgraceful and Apple should be ashamed: either at gouging their customers for more money or for not addressing a fairly common problem that is quite severe. (copying and pasting because I know my wifi will drop out before I can click on Add Reply).

I do have to wonder why there are so many comments about buying new routers and such... especially Apple branded routers. I am beginning to think something smells rotten in Denmark.

You know i been wondering same thing... I'm virtualy tired of this problem and reading. I read over hundret threads about this problem and its all same thing, general knowledge but no answer to the problem.

I told all my friends and people I came across considering to buy MAC not to do so.. This is pointless, I have laptop but its like I dont have it. Can't do anything on it, view sites or test my developments. It usless!!

I have a late 2010 Macbook pro, using Safari 10.6.8. Bought it as an upgrade from my HP laptop. When I purchased it we had Mediacom and there were no problems but I also had a desktop PC I used for work. The problems started when we switched to ATT Uverse 8/11. Since our PC is always on with no problems, ATT says it's an Apple problem, Apples says it's an ATT problem. Since we have the Uverse bundle and are happy with everything else and I had a desktop PC I used for work it wasn't a big deal. But my PC finally wore out and I'm using the mac exclusively. It freezes several times a day and has to be shut down and restarted - losing what I was working on. It loses the internet connection every time it's idle for a few minutes and has to be restarted to get it back. I've read everything and tried everything I could find, but nothing helps. Hubby's PC never has a connection problem -- but I need the software I have on the mac.

I've got too much money in this to just trash it and there are things I really like about it but I never anticipated having so many problems. I can't believe simply changing the internet provider caused the problem since so many others have the exact problem. Very frustrating and dissatisfied with Apple - thought we paid the big bucks to avoid this.

The Broadcom 43xx wireless nics are complete and utter garbage for all platforms other than Windows. I have no idea why Apple continues to use them in premium computers. This problem doesn't seem to be an OSX only problem:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/bcmwl/+bug/648331

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1204057
http://linux.bigresource.com/Fedora-Networking-broadcom-wifi-getting-disconnecte d-frequently-0wOujWwWf.html
http://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-technical-help-here/wireless/478650-wirel ess-connections-always-drops-after-20-pings-then-sendmsg-no-buffer-space-availab le.html
http://desktopthemeswallpaper.blogspot.com/2013/01/opensuse-forums-wireless-conn ection.html

Before my 2012 Macbook Pro, I had a dell laptop with a Broadcom 4311 (the exact same chipset used in many MBPs at least from 2006-2010, I'm fairly certain the same on in my MBP or at least a 4322) and when loaded with CentOS, Ubuntu, OpenSUSE, hackintosh OSX, Fedora, the connection would always drop after any type of real usage or when the chipset overheated. For whatever reason I had absolutely zero of the same problems when booted in Windows Vista, 7 or 8.

I imagine Broadcom maintains two different trees of the Broadcom driver for Windows and Unix/Unix-like platforms and the *nix driver is complete garbage. If Apple's implementation of the driver present in OSX is anything like Nvidia display drivers, then Apple probably uses the upstream as a reference driver which would explain why it's inhereted its inherent shoddiness.

Because of Apple's insistence that Macs run very quietly, I'm wondering if Macs tend to overheat just as Linux is known to overheat due to poor power management abilities (both equal components being noticeably less hot than when running Windows).

It always used to bug me because I could never do serious work on my dell because of Broadcom's crappy hardware and now I have to deal with that on my $2600 Mac as well.

yes, what has been said before is essentially correct. You are running into interference from various channels and stuff. You could try this : A Base station booster or ceiling antenna. go to macwireless.com. I don't work for them or Apple, but you gotta do somethin' because what's going on now just doesn't cut it

John b

Hi everyone, what eventually helped me was changing the wifi router settings – I stopped using channel 12 and above or the Auto option and forced to use channel 11 or lower. Since then no issue (home wifi network not in the menu, disconnecting, asking for password) whatsoever.

It wasn't QoS, security options, signal/antenna, router firmware, too many computers on the network, mac settings, b/g/n.

And this applies to Pro, Air and iPad as far as I know/have tried.