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USB C dongle kills wifi on 2017 Macbook pro

This is driving me crazy. MB Pro has no USB ports. All my devices are USB: mouse, keyboard, headphones, HD, USB stick, scanner, printer, SD card reader. So I have to use a USB C to USB 3 dongle. I have purchased 3. All have the same problem. Plug the dongle in, wifi stops working, but stays with 100% signal. With the dongle plugged in, if I stop and start wifi, it instantly connects with 100% signal, but no internet. IP and DNS are picked up correctly.


So what I do is I have to unplug, replug test, unplug, replug test, wifi off, wifi on, about 30 times until, after a random replug, it start working again.


I called up the manufacturer of my favourite dongle (Wavlink), and they sent me a firmware update, but this had no effect.


Some people have said that it is interference produce by the dongle. This seems to be nonsense, as moving the dongle close or far away has no effect - it can work or not work when the dongle is close, and work and not work when the dongle is far. The wifi always instantly connects, just doesn't work.


Other people have said this is due to a design fault in the MBPro, and that if you push the USB-C connector all the way in, it shorts with the unibody and stops the wifi working. I have not been able to reproduce this effect.


I spoke to a few other MBPro owners, and they said the had the same problem. One of them, who is richer than the rest of us got so sick of it he went out and replaced all his periperals, including external HD etc, with USB-C ones, and makes do with no dobngles. This limits how many things he can plug in at one time (2, including monitor), but this is not a solution for me as I have too many peripherals (dual HD monitors, mouse, keyboard, headset, and Ethernet dongle for when I cant get wifi to work due to this issue).


So there we have it, the only solution I have found is to use an ethernet cable and yet another dongle. This works when you are right next to the router. I have started traveling with a 10m ethernet cable, so I can use the MB Pro in a different room to the USB router. Its quite dangerous though.


My 3 different USB dongles work flawlessly with my MSI Gaming laptop, which also has thunderbolt/USB-C, so there is nothing wrong with the dongles - its the Mac.

MacBook Pro TouchBar and Touch ID, macOS High Sierra (10.13.4)

Posted on Aug 24, 2018 8:36 AM

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Posted on Oct 1, 2018 9:07 AM

User uploaded fileApple is being very disappointing to me... I did my way from Macbook air to macbook and now to macbook pro. My USB-C dongle works fine in Macbook but not in MB Pro as mentioned. I'm certain the problem cause is frequency interference. I put my hand around the dongle cable and Wifi works fine. I remove hand and wifi stops. So I wrapped the 10cm dongle cable with kitchen aluminum foil and now dongle and wifi are working. I write this text with dongle connected and LG monitor connected to HDMI dongle socket and is working well.

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USB C dongle kills wifi on 2017 Macbook pro

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