Q: Macbook does not select closest Wi-Fi Channel for the same SSID
SOLVED - I have Macbook 6,1 running 10.11.6. At my cottage I have the Internet router in the cottage (2427 Mhz ch 4) and a router configured as a WAP in the boathouse (ch 8). Both broadcast the same SSID.
I normally use my Mac in the cottage sitting about 4 feet from the main Internet router yet the Mac continually switches to the boathouse which is 60 feet away. When I turned off the boathouse router, it switched to the internet router in the cottage but then switched back to the boathouse sometime after. I use the Wireless Diagnostics to see which channel its on to figure this out.
I sometimes have delays when it's connected to the boathouse. The boathouse routers is on POWER LAN connection to the main Internet router.
My Wi-Fi security is "WPA2(AES)-PSK" on the main Internet router and "WPA2/WPA mixed-mode" (WPA2-Personal with AES encryption, and WPA-Personal with TKIP encryption)on the Boathouse router. The mixed mode is because of some older devices.
My main Internet router only covers 20Mhz range while the boathouse supported 20/40 MHz. As soon as I changed my boathouse router to only broadcast 20Mhz, my Mac switched and connected to the closer main Internet router.
So, the lesson learned is if you are having problems with connecting to the closest Wi-Fi channel on the same SSID, make sure there is not something that makes one router appear to offer better performance.
Posted on Sep 18, 2016 12:45 PM