Problem with networking a Mac Mini

richiestang78 · May 2, 2005

I bought a Mac Mini for my Mom as a gift, well its great except I have had netowrking problemsw ith it since the beginning. My problem consists of the Mac Mini refusing to go through the router onto the internet unless the ehternet cable is unplugged and plugged back in while the Mini is on. On the Apple Discusson boards a few people have had the same problem as I with Netgear, Dlink and a host of other router brands. Well after a call to Dlink(my router) they figured it was a Hardware/Software problem with the Mini, and I aggred since a 5 year old Power Mac, my PB and my brothers PB all work perfectly with it. Well I called Apple and basically they blew me off blaming the router, after a second call to them, which this tech tried alittle harder to fix my problem he came to the same uneducated answer of its my router. I told both techs i tried a linksys router and still had the same problem and still they told me it is a router issue all bescause the Mini works fine when plugged directly into the cable modem. I might have believed them if 3 other macs didnt work with it. I love Apple to death but I get more help from Dell and IBM support when I call them instead of Apple.

Amen-Moses · May 2, 2005

richiestang78 said:
I bought a Mac Mini for my Mom as a gift, well its great except I have had netowrking problemsw ith it since the beginning. My problem consists of the Mac Mini refusing to go through the router onto the internet unless the ehternet cable is unplugged and plugged back in while the Mini is on. On the Apple Discusson boards a few people have had the same problem as I with Netgear, Dlink and a host of other router brands. Well after a call to Dlink(my router) they figured it was a Hardware/Software problem with the Mini, and I aggred since a 5 year old Power Mac, my PB and my brothers PB all work perfectly with it. Well I called Apple and basically they blew me off blaming the router, after a second call to them, which this tech tried alittle harder to fix my problem he came to the same uneducated answer of its my router. I told both techs i tried a linksys router and still had the same problem and still they told me it is a router issue all bescause the Mini works fine when plugged directly into the cable modem. I might have believed them if 3 other macs didnt work with it. I love Apple to death but I get more help from Dell and IBM support when I call them instead of Apple.

That's why I always buy Belkin.

Both ends are probably working fine it's probably just because the router is under spec, the Mini signals are at the low end of the spec which is fine and a good thing as it reduces current draw and emissions etc but if your cable is bad or the router cannot handle the full range of the spec then you will have problems like this. Have you tried different cables or different ports on the router? Does the problem occur when the mini is the only computer plugged into the router?

The other possibility os a software/firmware issue.

When you say that the Mini is "refusing" do you mean that you get some error message or is it just not connecting at all. Does the IP address at the Mini change when you unplug it and plug it back in? What sort of set-up do you have, is the router issuing the IP addresses or are they static?

Amen-Moses

embries · May 2, 2005

Side note DLink, Netgear and Linksys are all one company which was subsequently bought out by Cisco.

Moses there has some good suggestions. Can you hit the router by IP from the Mini? http://192.168.1.1 (or 192.168.0.1 as some firmware versions used). If you can get to the router but not to the internet, I'll suspect a setting mismatch on the mini. If you can't get to the router via IP then I'm guessing hardware problem (bad cable, bad port on the router).

shaun89 · May 2, 2005

i know what you mean by apples phone support being crappy, its the ****z. the people on the phone actually are idiots. anyways, try resetting the router with the little pin hole on the back, if it has one.

embries · May 2, 2005

After rereading your post I'm inclined to think you need to flash your firmware on your router. I had a similar problem with my linksys (one of the very first befsr41) and they eventually fixed it via firmware update. See if there's an update to your firmware, flash it then manually unplug the power from your router then reconnect it. If the mini is able to get through when you unplug the cable then reconnect it while the router is on, this indicates that it's not getting an IP address from the router when it boots. This means that the router is probably leaving the session open when the unit is off (most likely due to boot on network options on the mini, i.e. even though the mini is off, the net card retains power so that the comp can be booted by a network signal). As I say, I ran into a similar problem and firmware update fixed it. Give us some more info and maybe we can fix this puppy up for you.

dtravis7 · May 2, 2005

Agreed, If you can give us more info. You say it works everytime with the cable directly from the modem into the Mini correct? I have a Mini and 4 Linksys routers and one Netgear router. It works perfectally every time with all of them. The only time there were problems was on all my macs when 10.3.8 came out, and only with the Netgear which was something in 10.3.8 and multicasting. Most Netgear routers do not do Multicasting correctly or at all. I took out the Netgear and tried every Linksys and they all worked perfectally. It was nothing like your problem though and was for sure the update. 10.3.9 solved it but I am using the Linksys anyway as really it's a better router.

Is the network cable going from the router to the Mini wired correctly? Have you tried swapping cables for the fun of it? It could be a setting in the network settings on the mINI also.

Tell us more. I have never seen your problem with any of my Macs nor PCs. My network is quite large.

rman · May 3, 2005

Mod note: Give the thread a better title.

mcsenerd · May 3, 2005

Well...just for grins and giggles...here's what I'd try...

I'd first go into System Preferences and manually set the ethernet mode to 100 BaseT Full Duplex...removing possible Autonegotiation issues. Secondly, I'd give the dang thing a static IP address on your LAN subnet. I'd try that and see what happens.

Do you have a model number for this Dlink? I'm in agreement w/ everyone else...if you could provide a little more detailed information other than just ranting...I'm betting myself or someone else here could likely suggest a solution for you.

Problem with networking a Mac Mini

richiestang78

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Amen-Moses

embries

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shaun89

embries

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dtravis7

rman

mcsenerd

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