New to Mac- Networking problems

Hi
I am new to mac.

I am having some trouble connecting to the internet using a wireless router. The mac connects to the router no problem but then does not seem to connect to the internet.

When I connect physically via an ethernet, it connects to the internet. But not via the wireless. PCs seem to connect fine.

I have no idea what can cause this. Any ideas?

Net said:

Hi
I am new to mac.

I am having some trouble connecting to the internet using a wireless router. The mac connects to the router no problem but then does not seem to connect to the internet.

When I connect physically via an ethernet, it connects to the internet. But not via the wireless. PCs seem to connect fine.

I have no idea what can cause this. Any ideas?

Click to expand...

Sounds like a problem with your wireless security settings and/or MAC filtering. Tell us a little more about your wireless router (make/model) and how it's configured.

I am having the same problem at the moment and it's been driving me nuts all weekend. Thing is it all worked fine for six months.
Mac Book Pro
d-link DIR-635 router
FWA [Fixed Wireless Access]
What seems odd is that I can get my son's desktop [PC running Vista] to access the internet via WIFI but if I try to join via Airport it knocks his out.
I've tried resetting the router.
I've also tried my internet company - who did say there was a fault on Friday night [Was very windy] but all works via ethernet. [Although I still think there are anomalies.
There is a possibility it's the MBP as I did a software update on Friday night [Running leopard]
But I guess I'll find that out as I'm away on business for the coming week.

Any ideas?

BTW I have tried the router on various security settings including the very basic defaults. However when all was working fine it was on WPA 2

Fatboydim said:

I am having the same problem at the moment and it's been driving me nuts all weekend. Thing is it all worked fine for six months.
Mac Book Pro
d-link DIR-635 router
FWA [Fixed Wireless Access]
What seems odd is that I can get my son's desktop [PC running Vista] to access the internet via WIFI but if I try to join via Airport it knocks his out.
I've tried resetting the router.
I've also tried my internet company - who did say there was a fault on Friday night [Was very windy] but all works via ethernet. [Although I still think there are anomalies.
There is a possibility it's the MBP as I did a software update on Friday night [Running leopard]
But I guess I'll find that out as I'm away on business for the coming week.

Any ideas?

Click to expand...

If it was working fine and then all of a sudden, things stopped working, chances are one of your neighbors recently started running a wireless access point that is conflicting with yours. Try changing the channel your router runs on.

cwa107 said:

If it was working fine and then all of a sudden, things stopped working, chances are one of your neighbors recently started running a wireless access point that is conflicting with yours. Try changing the channel your router runs on.

Click to expand...

I've already tried that. Besides which I live in rural Ireland so unlikely there's a wireless conflict as nearest house is beyond range. My concern is the fact that I can get the desktop PC to work without any problem.

The update on Friday night was 10.5.2 and I have a suspicion that this may have caused an issue.

Fatboydim said:

I've already tried that. Besides which I live in rural Ireland so unlikely there's a wireless conflict as nearest house is beyond range. My concern is the fact that I can get the desktop PC to work without any problem.

The update on Friday night was 10.5.2 and I have a suspicion that this may have caused an issue.

Click to expand...

Mac wi-fi drivers are notoriously pickier about router settings than Windows drivers are. It's not even a hardware thing, as the chipsets are not unique to Apple and many people report that wi-fi problems don't persist in Windows.

There are a few things I would recommend checking and changing if you can:

1. Make sure your router's firmware is up-to-date.
2. If using WEP, switch to WPA or WPA2.
3. Experiment with different channels - it might not even be a neighbor as things like 2.4GHz wireless phones and microwave ovens can cause problems.
4. And last, but absolutely not least, make sure that SSID broadcast is enabled. Macs hate hidden SSIDs.

Thanks CWA - they are all things that I've tried. happily My MBP has no trouble accessing the Hotel's WIFi and the airport [as in an airport] was fine as well. so i think it's definitely a problem with the FWA providers. as they did report a drop in service on Friday. I'm sure I'll get to the bottom of it.

Fatboydim said:

I've already tried that. Besides which I live in rural Ireland so unlikely there's a wireless conflict as nearest house is beyond range.

Click to expand...

Have you run AP Grapher or iStumbler to verify this?

PerryLynch said:

Have you run AP Grapher or iStumbler to verify this?

Click to expand...

No -Not familiar with those programs. But considering that even with an 802.11n router and all 802.11n equipment I cannot get a signal in half the rooms of the house it seems unlikely. We have very very thick concrete floors and walls.

Been doing some investigating and it does seem that the most likely culprit is the software update to 10.5.2. There seems to be an issue with automatic updates for some people. It is most likely corrupt files. This would make sense as my service provider had problems the night I did my update. So corrupt files = problems with particular router. plist files seem to be the issue - but identifying exactly which ones is the problem. The main suspect is com.apple.internetconfig.plist
Which can be found under Library / preferences.
It has worked for others - to delete the file and then reboot. I'll try this and report back.

The above sollution didn't work - But this did:

Log into the wireless router and drop the fragmentation threshold and the frame threshold to 2306. Now it works great. Fast and connects every time.