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Poor wifi reception on new iPad

I am in a hotel with my laptop and new ipad3. The laptop wifi reception is as strong as it gets, but the iPad only registers a weak signal. Anyone else having similar problems? Any suggestions?

iPad (3rd generation) Wi-Fi, iOS 5.1

Posted on Mar 17, 2012 7:33 PM

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1,477 replies

Jan 12, 2013 4:13 PM in response to stlsteve

Ok this is weird but has worked for many people. I tried s search this Community to see if anyone here has already pointed this out but I can't figure out how to search all of this. I found this on YouTube today: http://youtu.be/uwWtIG5jUxE It's about adjusting the Brightness on your iPad. Esentially, turn off Auto Adjust Brightness, turn Brightness all the way up and wait a minute or two. For some people it works right away. It didn't work for me, so I powered off my iPad4 then turned it back on and I was going to try the procedure agaim - nut I saw when it came back on I had full wifi where I only had 1/2 before I did this! After the fix it appears you can put the brightness where ever you want. Seems like Apple could send this out in an update and auto correct it for everyone wihtout having to manually do this.

Jan 18, 2013 8:27 AM in response to mpetra

My Interesting fix to the problem: Redoing the home network.


This was at my friends house and I was helping him with unreliable connectivity on his Ipad4, even though other devices worked fine. As a last ditch effort we reconfigured his home network.


Orignal network had the Fios router in the upstairs family room (with wireless disabled) as we had an airport express (which created a wifi network) to stream music via airplay. This was connected to the adjacent Fios router via ethernet. From the Fios router ethernet ran down to his basement where we had a "switch" to connect other ethernet devices. I say "switch" as it was actually an old repurposed (ethernet only) Linksys router set up as a switch -- DHCP disabled and fixed IP address assigned so I know we didn't have a double NAT problem.


New network. We moved the Fios router to the basement which also gave him wifi down there. We replaced the Linksys "Switch" that had been in the basement with a netgear gigabit switch as there are multiple ethernet devices to connect down there. The only ethernet connection to the Fios router is one cable going to the gigabit switch giving us an internal all gigabit network


In the family roon we installed another Netgear gigabit switch (connected to the basement switch via ethernet) as we no longer had the ethernet ports from the Fios router's ports available. Apple Airport Express and Sony TV connect to this switch.


Forwhatever reason the other devices in his home had been happy with the old setup, just not the ipad4.


Now it works flawlessly. I can't tell you if it was the old Linksys "switch" that was the problem, or if the fact that it had been repurposed from a switch to a router that was at fault, only that it works now. Again everything else worked fine on the old setup except for the ipad4. (FYI, this is a DM series ipad4)

Jan 18, 2013 10:52 AM in response to CEB20816

Yes, you are right. Also, apparently a lot of people only use their iPads at home. Apple and many other places I found while looking for a fix go into all the detail of our home systems, but they weren't addressing the same issue away from home - well unless we wanted to make everyone everywhere update their routers for us - LOL. Anyway the Brightness is an oddball fix but it seems to work for everyone who has tried it. I did notice after iOS6 came out that the Brightness was not working correctly on my iPhone and didn't seem to adjust noticably on the iPad4 with or without autoadjust. Somehow it does something to the wifi - weird but true. Seems if Apple would seriously look at that it could be sent in an update fix quite easiliy. I can see they don't want to admit adjusting the Brightness will fix your wifi connection - when would the Android folks' laughing stop? Oh, right after the maps deal.

Jan 18, 2013 5:30 PM in response to mpetra

Hello!

I'm an italian user. I have an iPad 3g + cellular (third generation) with iOS 6.0.1.


I have this problem. When I switch from wifi connection to 3g connection or when I connect the iPad to a new wifi hotspot or when I turn on my router (I turn off the router nightly) che connection is much slow. It is impossible to surf the net.


In the moment I solve this problem turn off and turn on (restart with the bottom near the rear camera) my iPad every time I change the connection. It is so bad but is the only solution to use the fast connection. Indeed, after this restart, the connection is ok.


We have other solutions?


Please Apple, help us!


I look forward the iOS 6.1!

Jan 20, 2013 1:12 PM in response to Landi

I always enjoy the sanctimonious replies to real problems which attempt to blame the victims while claiming that the designers are infallible gods.


In my case, my 4G ipad worked great for the first couple of months, then suddenly developed a problem recieving signals.

My wife's identical ipad, purchased at the same time, but with a small fraction of the usage of mine still works great,yet mine, while sitting right next to hers, held in the same position, doesn't.

You can't explain that away by blaming the victim.


Btw, we use an airport extreme, based on research for the best available wi-fi access point after finally getting tired of having to "reset the router" every two weeks. (dating from long before I bought this ipad)

In addition, this problem is noticable on all other networks that I use.

Poor wifi reception on new iPad

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