Q: iOS 8 Wi-Fi problems

So the Airport Extreme is a 802.11ac MIMO router.  I've played with turning "Wi-Fi services" off and on.  My packet trace does show a lot of DNS local resolver cache being flushed.  I wonder why it is being flushed out so frequently.  I've attached it. It's small. Hope you can read it. BTW, when you turn on your "WiFi Services" and run the speed test again, does the result drastically degrade?

I am working.... For the past 5 hours...   FINALLY!

My setup:

• iPad Mini Retina
• NetGear 802.11ac R7000 router

Things I tried, but made NO difference:

• Turning off 2.4ghz or just 5ghz on the Router
• Turning off "WiFi networking" in Location Privacy
• Resetting network settings

What fixed it:

• Backed up my iPad
• Moved any "critical" data to the cloud or other sources
• Completely "Restored" my iPad through iTunes to 8.0.2
• I did NOT restore my backup.  I re-downloaded the apps.
• Most of my apps (DropBox, iCloud, Evernote, Email) resync their data

I still then had to power off / restart completely after several minutes to make iCloud Photo Sharing come to life.  This seems to have fixed things.

Another change, but it *shouldn't* make a difference. On my Router in the Wireless Configuration, I forced the 2.4ghz to only allow up to "289mbps"...  Basically, it disables wifi Channel Bonding.  Why this would make a difference?  No idea...  But maybe iOS 8 is getting confused on trying to pick the "best performing" network band, and I just made iOS' life a bit simpler.

I'm going to test roaming around the house and see if it gets flaky again!

Upgraded to 8.0.2, reset of all Wifi network, cancelled all bluetooth profile, restarted iPad mini retina. Gone well, i hope. A 5days nightmare ended. I hope.

Glad I could help.

I was working on this since updating last Wednesday, it was very frustrating. 

I am reminded of the network issues when iOS 6 was released, seems that Apple did something wrong again.

Cheers.

This must be the reason why the connection is dropped, too many flushes apperantly.

BTW tried to turn on Wifi Networking and Ookla test result is same.

Just saying.  Everybody quotes 8.8.8.8 because it is easy.  But, if you can use Open DNS and not be spied on, why not?  It is just as good as Google DNS, and not committed to spying on you.

I wish they would fix it as well.

You are right, we are feeding them to get fat:)

I tried to 4 devices switch from 8.8.8.8 to my default DNS.

Lets see whats happends.

You're right, I quote Googles DNS because it is easy, because I am offering what worked for me to people who may not like technology as much, or may have no knowledge of places like OpenDNS and so would not trust IP's from a company they have not heard of. This would possibly stop them from seeing if what worked for me and others works for them as well.

But let's be honest, 99% of iDevice users NEVER think about let alone know about changing IP settings that are automatically set up for them and instead do as 99% of people do and just let their devices connect to the default settings offered by their router which is set up to get its information from the ISP and the ISP certainly uses Google's DNS in the mix somewhere so they were sharing in the first place.

That is why I stated an easy IP of 8.8.8.8 to make the attempt to get networking functional for the frustrated iDevice owners working quickly. 

That's all.

How on earth can Apple put out a product that simply does not work???? 

I'm not trying to make excuses for Apple, but I'll make a few comments.

It seems to me that Apple didn't do an adequate job of testing the product. What was the story with the beta program?   Apple seems a little too closed mouth on acknowledging problems. Probably a little to rushed in pushing the product out of the door.  Products always ship with bugs.  It's a judgment call on how important it is.  How many routers are out there?  How many do you test with?

Wifi is nothing new.  It has been around in various forms for a long time. 

The standards are constantly changing to improve network speed.  Take mimo,  It's relatively new. When a new standard comes out,  it means someone has to integrate it into an existing product.  There are lots of chances for mistakes.

And all products on the market use it successfully right out of the box.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/windows-phone-8-problems/

do these google queries:

wifi problems surface

wifi problems android

wifi problems windows phone 8

Seriously, I was going to buy an iPhone 6 next month.  But now I am considering a Windows phone.

Some work.   Buy one an return it in 14 days if it doesn't.

As I said, I understand your motivation.  But, just because most users are ignorant and innocent, is no reason to lead the lambs to the slaughter.  These same people buy Android devices because they are cheaper or have other gimmicks with no understanding of the web of spyware that they are entering into.

I think that those of us who understand have a responsibility to protect the innocent.

they didn't specifically say it had to be 8.0.2, that just happened to be the latest update available this morning. I did a fresh recover without backup as a new device. What can I say, my iPad had not worked all week but has been completely fine all day now. And believe me, I spent many hours fiddling with solutions from forum posters, admittedly not the 8.8.8.8 DNS thing though................

Just downloaded version 8.0.2 and it seems to have solved the issue for me.

Its quite possible that there is more than one problem with wifi. However what I am seeing is not related to DNS or any of the other network settings.

I have my own DNS server, and multiple devices are using it, so I know its working just fine, and much faster than the Google public DNS.

What I see is that if I ping the access point, which is a professional AP, not part of a domestic router, with any device EXCEPT my iPad I see a ping time of less than a mili second. Which is what you would expect.

Now, if I perform the same test from the iPad, the ming time is more like 30ms. Being generous, that is 30x more. Watch those ping times and you start to see outliers, with pings in the 100s of ms,

After a few hours, most pings are in the hundred ms rang, with outliers into seconds. Leave it a bit longer, and you start to see packets dropped.

Eventually there are more packets being dropped that are being returned, this is the point at which things become totally unresponsive.

You really have to look at ping times, Speedtest isn't a good indicator, until you get into the end stages and nothing really works any more.

Speedtest is designed to test throughput over wide areas. The way you do this is not to request a block of data and wait for it to arrive before asking for the next, you have a "window" of requests - basically, you request N blocks of data, and as each arrives, you send a request for one more. This ensures that there is a constant stream of data arriving, as fast as your network connection can deliver it. This is done to make the test independent of network latency. That will include latency in your wifi connection.

Looking at the round-trip time of individual packets, going over that few feet between your iOS device and your access point  is what really matters.

If you have a slow ping, DNS is not involved, and honestly, any difference due to the band or MIMO is not going to account for 30ms, which is enough time for a packet to go coast to coast and back in the USA.

Thanks Philip for this analysis.  I was wondering if it was done on iOS 8.0 or 8.0.2?  Has there been an improvement with the update?