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Back to my Mac works intermittently only

The "Back to my Mac" function only works intermitently, and I'm at a loss as to why.


Here's the current, and very common situation. All Macs are on Mavericks unless otherwise noted.


  1. I'm at home, connecting to Macs in my studio. Same ISP, FWIT
  2. Yesterday I was able to connect from my MacBook Air to my studio iMac, no problem. Today, I can not. I get the "server may not exist" errorUser uploaded file
  3. Currently I can connect to another Mac in the studio, and to another Mac in my home (home one not on Mavericks), no problem. So it doesn't appear to be a BTMM network issue.
  4. The iMac I can't connect to is online, which I have verified by using the live view function on Witness (security camera type software) on the Mac. It's showing me a live view of the studio, so it is (at least partially) functiona.
  5. The Mac that I can connect to in the Studio is also currently locked by Witness, so it shouldn't be that Witness is blocking it. Regardless, yesterday when I connected just fine Witness was on, and I've connected successfully hundreds of times while Witness was locked.


Unfortunately this is a common occurance. I'd say maybe 1/4 of the time I want to connect to my iMac, I can't. It may or may not connect at a later time, or it may not work until I'm back in the studio and can reboot it. In fact tomorrow (Sunday) the iMac will reboot on schedule, so I'll find out if I can connect using BTMM after that.


In the meantime… any ideas on why on earth this happens? How to avoid? How to fix remotely? Or barring all that, a good replacement service? This is getting old. And frankly I still can't believe that I can't access BTMM from the iPad!


thanks

-Joseph

iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Posted on Apr 5, 2014 12:22 PM

Reply
6 replies

Apr 5, 2014 12:57 PM in response to Kappy

Thanks Kappy for the links, however since it works often but not always, it's not really a setup issue. Cleary I have set it up successfully since it worked yesterday, then with no (known) changes, doesn't today. And again this is a common occurance; I'll be away on a trip, will log in just fine, then another day, won't be able to.


I did check for multiple-NAT configurations by BTMM'ing into the one Mac I can in the studio and ran the traceroute, and can confirm that I do NOT have multiple-NAT. As expected though, as I only have one Airport in there.


cheers

-Joseph

Apr 5, 2014 1:01 PM in response to jlinaschke

Given this is wireless have you checked if you are losing wireless intermittently? If you are near a microwave or some older 2400 MHz telephones, these can interfere with wireless when in use.


Otherwise, I would suggest reinstalling Mavericks (10.9.2, not 10.9) to see if that helps:


Reinstall Lion, Mountain Lion, or Mavericks without erasing drive


Boot to the Recovery HD:


Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.


Repair


When the recovery menu appears select Disk Utility. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported then click on the Repair Permissions button. When the process is completed, then quit DU and return to the main menu.


Reinstall Mountain Lion or Mavericks


OS X Mavericks- Reinstall OS X

OS X Mountain Lion- Reinstall OS X

OS X Lion- Reinstall Mac OS X


Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet

if possible because it is three times faster than wireless.

Apr 5, 2014 9:19 PM in response to Kappy

Kappy,


Thanks again for trying to help. The connectoin isn't wireless; all my studio Macs are hard wired. The home MacBook Air I'm trying to connect from is wired, but that isn't where the problem is. Or, is it… (more in a moment).


Also FYI this isn't an issue unique to Mavericks. I've had this problem with BTMM for as long as I can remember, across many systems and OSs.


However… I got it to work. Guess how… by rebooting my MacBook Air! (The Mac I'm connecting from) I never would have expected that to be an issue since I was able to connect to other Macs from here. I'll be sure to try that next time this happens and will report back here to see if it helps again. Totally bizarre, IMHO.


Thanks again, and I will likely be rebuilding this Air from scratch soon anyway. Although as I said, I've had this issue pretty much ever since BTTM came out.


cheers

-Joseph

Oct 22, 2014 5:13 PM in response to jlinaschke

Hey jlinaschke,

I often run into the same issue. The solution to this particular issue for me has been to open Airport Utility app and restart the airport. I have found that one of my Airport Extreme (ac) routers is more prone to this than the other. If I'm at the other location I can click on Other Wi-Fi Devices and reboot the remote AE. (They are linked with my Apple ID.)


Hope this helps.

Mano

Back to my Mac works intermittently only

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