evintage
Level 1 (4 points)
Photos for Mac

Q: TC and iMac IP conflict

Came home from vacay to an IP conflict error message on my iMac mid 2007. My AirPort TC has grabbed the iMac's IP and won't let go. Every other wireless device on the network can grab an IP. We have AppleTV,  iPhone, iPad even a G5 that are humming along and I am dead in the water. Can't use a static IP as a workaround as I have previously for other problems. I am running El Capitain now 10.11.5 I have rebooted everything dozens of times, even removed my AirPort Extreme extender to eliminate that as a possible source of problems. My ISP won't touch anything Macintosh but they confirmed with all the other devices running it must be the iMac. I tried changing the password on the TC so that any unauthorized connections would be dropped but that failed. Do I have to reset the TC? If I do will I lose my backups? The iMac and the G5 were both using the TC for backups.

iMac, OS X El Capitan (10.11.5), 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 4 GB RAM

Posted on Aug 16, 2016 2:23 PM

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evintage

Q: TC and iMac IP conflict

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  • by Tesserax,Helpful

    Tesserax Tesserax Aug 18, 2016 2:35 AM in response to evintage
    Level 9 (54,906 points)
    Wireless
    Aug 18, 2016 2:35 AM in response to evintage

    My AirPort TC has grabbed the iMac's IP and won't let go.

    Try the following to release and refresh the IP address provided to your iMac from the Time Capsule (TC):

    • System Preferences > Network > Wi-Fi > Advanced > TCP/IP tab
    • Note the value for IPv4 Address
    • Click on the "Renew DHCP Lease" button.
    • Check the IPv4 value again. Did it change?

     

    You shouldn't have to reset the TC to resolve this ... but, if you do, none of the reset types (soft, hard, or factory default) will erase any of the data on the TC's internal drive or any drive connected to its USB port.

  • by evintage,

    evintage evintage Aug 18, 2016 3:01 AM in response to Tesserax
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Aug 18, 2016 3:01 AM in response to Tesserax

    Thank you Tesserax. It's good to know the data on the TC is secure.

     

    Renew DHCP Lease did not result in a new IP address being picked up By the iMac.

     

    I decided to do a Hard Reset on TC and while trying to reconnect to it from the iMac I received the message "an unexpected error occurred". TC had retained the Wi-Fi network settings (the network name appeared during the reconnection process) but it couldn't connect, I assume this was because of the ongoing IP conflict.

     

    I then took another AirPort base station, that I had been using to extend the network, and created a new Wi-Fi network which solved my problem; the iMac and every device in range can connect. Unfortunately, this means I no longer have a TC or extender to provide backups and coverage in all parts of the house. (The added benefit of this approach, however, was that my neighbour's FitBit is no longer attached to my network.)

     

    iMac may have picked up another IP now, or at least it may let me set a static IP, which in the past has worked. I think the TC will need a factory reset to finally drop that IP, which shouldn't be necessary, but before I do that I'll try and restore the old network.