WiFi keeps needing to be turned off / on for internet access since update to OS X El Capitan

I've had the exact same problem, and it started with El Capitan, was fixed briefly in Dec2015, and continues today.

I have two Macs: a 2014 Macbook Pro and a 2015 Air. I can run PING 8.8.8.8 in the console, and after a while of being connected, I start getting timeouts. If at any time I turn off the wireless and turn it back on, the connection re-establishes itself and the pings continue to succeed. I have tried two different wireless routers with my ISP.

I do notice when I use my phone as a hotspot, or I use other wireless access points besides my house, the networking is fine.

I have a Motorola cable modem / AP now and previously an ARRIS. My ISP says nothing is wrong with my connection and doing speed and ping tests via my iPhone on the wireless, that seems to be true. The iPhone has no problems. Only the MacBooks.

There is most likely some software conflict that is contributing to this.

I suggest you run Etrecheck on the affected machine and post its report here.

Also, an easy test is to boot your mac in Safe Mode and see if the drop outs still occur (I am betting/hoping they won't).

(Your mac will boot and work more slowly in Safe Mode; that is expected)

EtreCheck version: 2.9.9 (260)

Report generated 2016-03-09 08:45:46

Download EtreCheck from https://etrecheck.com

Runtime 1:34

Performance: Excellent

Click the [Support] links for help with non-Apple products.

Click the [Details] links for more information about that line.

Check Apple signatures: Enabled

Problem: Other problem

Description:

wireless

Hardware Information: ⓘ

MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Mid 2014)

[Technical Specifications] - [User Guide] - [Warranty & Service]

MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro11,2

1 2.2 GHz Intel Core i7 CPU: 4-core

16 GB RAM Not upgradeable

BANK 0/DIMM0

8 GB DDR3 1600 MHz ok

BANK 1/DIMM0

8 GB DDR3 1600 MHz ok

Bluetooth: Good - Handoff/Airdrop2 supported

Wireless: en0: 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac

Battery: Health = Normal - Cycle count = 3

Video Information: ⓘ

Intel Iris Pro

Color LCD 2880 x 1800

System Software: ⓘ

OS X El Capitan 10.11.3 (15D21) - Time since boot: about 13 days

Disk Information: ⓘ

APPLE SSD SM0256F disk0 : (251 GB) (Solid State - TRIM: Yes)

EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted> : 210 MB

Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted> [Recovery]: 650 MB

Macintosh HD (disk1) / [Startup]: 249.77 GB (15.51 GB free) (Low!)

Core Storage: disk0s2 250.14 GB Online

USB Information: ⓘ

LaCie Porsche Mobile for Mac 2 TB

EFI (disk2s1) <not mounted> : 210 MB

LaCie (disk2s2) /Volumes/LaCie : 2.00 TB (32.08 GB free)

Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad

Apple Inc. BRCM20702 Hub

Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

Thunderbolt Information: ⓘ

Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus

Gatekeeper: ⓘ

Anywhere

Kernel Extensions: ⓘ

/Applications/LaCie Desktop Manager.app

[not loaded] com.LaCie.ScsiType00 (1.2.13 - SDK 10.5 - 2014-08-09) [Support]

[not loaded] com.jmicron.driver.jmPeripheralDevice (2.0.4 - 2014-08-09) [Support]

[not loaded] com.lacie.driver.LaCie_RemoteComms (1.0.1 - SDK 10.5 - 2014-08-09) [Support]

[not loaded] com.oxsemi.driver.OxsemiDeviceType00 (1.28.13 - SDK 10.5 - 2014-08-09) [Support]

/Library/Application Support/Fortinet/FortiClient/nke

[not loaded] com.fortinet.fct.kext.avkern (1.0.1 - SDK 10.8 - 2015-11-01) [Support]

[not loaded] com.fortinet.fct.kext.fctapnke (1 - SDK 10.8 - 2015-11-01) [Support]

[not loaded] com.fortinet.fct.kext.fctwfnke (1.0 - SDK 10.8 - 2015-11-01) [Support]

[not loaded] com.fortinet.kext.fctrouternke (1 - SDK 10.8 - 2015-11-01) [Support]

/Library/Extensions

[loaded] com.Cycling74.driver.Soundflower (2 - SDK 10.10 - 2016-02-28) [Support]

/System/Library/Extensions

[not loaded] com.IKMultimedia.driver.StompIO1 (1.0.0 - 2016-02-28) [Support]

[not loaded] com.ManyCamLLC.videodevice.driver (2.0.11 - SDK 10.7 - 2016-02-28) [Support]

[not loaded] com.ikmultimedia.driver.StealthPedal (1.0.0 - 2016-02-28) [Support]

[loaded] com.waves.driver.soundgrid (2.0.0 - 2016-02-28) [Support]

/System/Library/Extensions/ManyCamVideoDeviceDriver.kext/Contents/PlugIns

[not loaded] com.ManyCamLLC.videodevice.userclient (2.0.11 - SDK 10.7 - 2014-02-19) [Support]

System Launch Agents: ⓘ

[not loaded] 7 Apple tasks

[loaded] 144 Apple tasks

[running] 85 Apple tasks

System Launch Daemons: ⓘ

[not loaded] 42 Apple tasks

[loaded] 145 Apple tasks

[running] 101 Apple tasks

Launch Agents: ⓘ

[loaded] com.oracle.java.Java-Updater.plist (2014-09-30) [Support]

Launch Daemons: ⓘ

[loaded] com.ManyCamLLC.videodevice.daemon.plist (2014-02-19) [Support]

[failed] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist (2016-01-29) [Support]

[loaded] com.fortinet.forticlient.appfw.plist (2015-10-21) [Support]

[loaded] com.fortinet.forticlient.epctrl.plist (2015-10-21) [Support]

[failed] com.fortinet.forticlient.fmon.plist (2015-10-21) [Support]

[loaded] com.fortinet.forticlient.servctl.plist (2015-10-21) [Support]

[loaded] com.fortinet.forticlient.vpn.plist (2015-10-21) [Support]

[loaded] com.fortinet.forticlient.wf.plist (2015-10-21) [Support]

[loaded] com.microsoft.autoupdate.helpertool.plist (2016-01-12) [Support]

[loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensingV2.helper.plist (2015-11-05) [Support]

[loaded] com.oracle.java.Helper-Tool.plist (2014-09-30) [Support]

[loaded] com.rogueamoeba.instanton-agent.plist (2014-03-25) [Support]

[loaded] com.teamviewer.Helper.plist (2015-01-12) [Support]

User Launch Agents: ⓘ

[running] com.amazon.music.plist (2015-12-30) [Support]

[loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist (2016-03-01) [Support]

User Login Items: ⓘ

Qsync Client Application (/Applications/Qsync Client.app)

iTunesHelper Application (/Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/MacOS/iTunesHelper.app)

ManyCam UNKNOWN (missing value)

Android File Transfer Agent Application (~/Library/Application Support/Google/Android File Transfer/Android File Transfer Agent.app)

FortiClientAgent Application (/Applications/FortiClient.app/Contents/Resources/runtime.helper/FortiClientAge nt.app)

Other Apps: ⓘ

[running] com.google.Chrome.127712

[running] com.google.android.mtpagent.19232

[running] com.gopro.GoPro-Studio-GoPro-Importer

[running] com.microsoft.rdc.mac.59872

[running] com.qnap.qsync.134432

[running] com.tinyspeck.slackmacgap.144992

[loaded] com.tinyspeck.slackmacgap.152672

[loaded] org.videolan.vlc.74912

[loaded] 442 Apple tasks

[running] 217 Apple tasks

Internet Plug-ins: ⓘ

FlashPlayer-10.6: 20.0.0.306 - SDK 10.6 (2016-02-09) [Support]

QuickTime Plugin: 7.7.3 (2016-01-27)

Flash Player: 20.0.0.306 - SDK 10.6 (2016-02-09) [Support]

JavaAppletPlugin: Java 8 Update 71 build 15 (2016-01-25) Check version

AdobeAAMDetect: AdobeAAMDetect 2.0.0.0 - SDK 10.7 (2014-11-21) [Support]

Default Browser: 601 - SDK 10.11 (2016-01-27)

User internet Plug-ins: ⓘ

Picasa: 1.0 - SDK 10.6 (2015-02-13) [Support]

WebEx64: 1.0 - SDK 10.6 (2015-07-17) [Support]

Safari Extensions: ⓘ

AdBlock (2015-09-25)

Add To Amazon Wish List (2014-08-09)

My eBay Manager (2014-08-28)

FastestTube (2015-09-05)

3rd Party Preference Panes: ⓘ

Flash Player (2016-01-29) [Support]

Java (2016-01-25) [Support]

Time Machine: ⓘ

Skip System Files: NO

Auto backup: YES

Volumes being backed up:

Macintosh HD: Disk size: 249.77 GB Disk used: 234.26 GB

Destinations:

LaCie [Local]

Total size: 2.00 TB

Total number of backups: 110

Oldest backup: 9/27/14, 2:25 AM

Last backup: 3/9/16, 8:37 AM

Size of backup disk: Excellent

Backup size 2.00 TB > (Disk size 249.77 GB X 3)

Top Processes by CPU: ⓘ

6% WindowServer

2% kernel_task

2% fontd

0% Qsync Client

0% Google Chrome Helper(7)

Top Processes by Memory: ⓘ

4.51 GB com.apple.WebKit.WebContent(5)

1.25 GB kernel_task

1.23 GB Google Chrome Helper(7)

754 MB Safari

475 MB softwareupdated

Virtual Memory Information: ⓘ

35 MB Free RAM

16.00 GB Used RAM (2.04 GB Cached)

401 MB Swap Used

Diagnostics Information: ⓘ

Mar 7, 2016, 03:28:53 PM /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Microsoft Excel_2016-03-07-152853_[redacted].cpu_resource.diag [Details]

/Applications/Microsoft Excel.app/Contents/MacOS/Microsoft Excel

Mar 7, 2016, 03:25:04 PM /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Microsoft Excel_2016-03-07-152504_[redacted].cpu_resource.diag [Details]

STOP!!!!!!

Before you do anything, completely remove "mackkeeper" - this is a scam. It does not protect your mac, and in fact causes only problems.

Completely remove it. There are instructions for that.

Then try again, of even better, consider a clean installation of OS X and then import only your user account, not applications or settings.

😟this happened to me too im sorry m8

still having this problem on 2 different mac's. I had my ISP come out and verify the modem is ok. iPhones work fine on the wifi, just the mac's that disconnect.

tujuggernaut wrote:

still having this problem on 2 different mac's. I had my ISP come out and verify the modem is ok. iPhones work fine on the wifi, just the mac's that disconnect.

Uninstall that "fortinet" software.

That's how I access my corporate VPN. I'm supposed to give that up?

tujuggernaut wrote:

That's how I access my corporate VPN. I'm supposed to give that up?

Do you really need that? For vpn? What is wrong with OS X vpn services?

This claims to do a number of things, amongst them to work as an antivirus. Most antivirus for mac are not useful and in fact cause many sorts of trouble.

OK, well our IT systems administrator has mandated Fortinet client for VPN, can't use the Mac VPN natively.

I will uninstall that and see if it helps. However its very confusing as there was another user who I believe did not have this software experiencing the same error.

tujuggernaut wrote:

OK, well our IT systems administrator has mandated Fortinet client for VPN, can't use the Mac VPN natively.

I will uninstall that and see if it helps. However its very confusing as there was another user who I believe did not have this software experiencing the same error.

That other user had some nasty software installed ("mackeeper", a notorious scam). I recommended he unistalled it, but he did not report back.

Maybe fortinet, on the other hand, is legit, but when I see software that claims to "clean", "protect your mac" or "anitvirus", I know that they do not protect, cause performance issues and often other problems.

I just got 10.11.4 so we'll see if that helps at all.

Fortinet is legit. I understand what you are saying about MacKeeper, but I do not have any junk-ware on my machine. I consider myself a fairly savvy user as I am a computer scientist. I have no idea what is causing this problem though, except that I have it narrowed down to the Apple machines. Windows on my wireless works fine, as does iOS as does Droid OS. None of those devices experience what I do.

When I click on a website and I don't get a response, I quickly switch to my console window where I have PING Google.com running, and it always shows timeouts when I encounter the bug. Resetting the wireless by turning it off and then back on solves the problem every time. The pings succeed when the network comes back up and web browsing works properly. This happens roughly ever 15-30 minutes.

Again, just updated to 10.11.4 this afternoon.

yeah still having the same problem after upgrading the OS and then installing the newest FortiNet client (just to make sure that I had the latest).

I guess I will try removing the Fortinet client.