MBPro loses contact w/ my AirPort Extreme?

[RadDave]

Hi All,

Occasionally, when I bring up the AirPort Utility on my MBPro (specs in signature), I get a green light on the internet connection but a spinning ball which on hovering states that it's trying to read the settings from my AirPort Extreme router in the adjacent room - then the orange triangle appears as shown below. However, I can use the internet as I'm doing right now on the laptop.

If I log out and back into my account, both green lights show up for a while - at the same time using the AirPort Utility on my iPad Air2 & also viewing it on my cabled iMac shows both green lights lit. I ran 'wireless diagnostics' which seem to say all was OK - I can also ping my ISP. So, just not sure what the issue may be or whether it's even that important?

Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks - Dave

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[bobtomay]

Probably not that important, but it is strange. The only time I ever open Airport Utility is when I want to change something, so I wouldn't be happy to see that at all.

Have seen a few reports of internet and everything working fine while at the same time Airport Utility reporting no connection to the AE or TC - and we know it is connected or you'd have no internet. Resetting the AE is the only fix I've seen anyone affected by it report back as successful while a couple others say it didn't help. A couple of others saying the issue was intermittent - which would tend to make me think the AE has the beginnings of a hardware problem.

 

[RadDave]

Probably not that important, but it is strange. The only time I ever open Airport Utility is when I want to change something, so I wouldn't be happy to see that at all.

Have seen a few reports of internet and everything working fine while at the same time Airport Utility reporting no connection to the AE or TC - and we know it is connected or you'd have no internet. Resetting the AE is the only fix I've seen anyone affected by it report back as successful while a couple others say it didn't help. A couple of others saying the issue was intermittent - which would tend to make me think the AE has the beginnings of a hardware problem.

Hi Bobtomay - thanks for the comments - the AE is just 18 months old and as stated I'm still getting 2 green lights in AirPort Utility (AU) on my cabled iMac & our iDevices, so likely a software issue w/ Yosemite settings on my MBPro and probably since upgrading from Mavericks (not a clean install) - don't remember the behavior w/ the AE on my other OS Xs.

Found a good Yosemite Wi-Fi discussion on OSXDaily w/ the opening paragraph quoted below; they offered a variety of potential solutions - I did try the first suggestion last night (basically deleting a bunch of preference files and then rebooting) - AU did behave normally for about an hour, then back to my initial screen capture.

Again, the internet is working fine on the laptop w/ the same DL speeds that I'm getting on my iMac & iDevices - maybe the next update to Yosemite will offer some help? Dave

Some Mac users who upgraded to OS X Yosemite have discovered a variety of wireless network connectivity issues, ranging from dropping wi-fi connections, to an inability to connect to the outside world despite being connected to a wifi router, even suddenly and strangely slow internet speeds. These network issues seem to occur most often on Macs that have updated to OS X Yosemite from Mavericks rather than those who performed a clean Yosemite install, which could suggest the issue has to do with improper network setting and preferences, or even a corrupted file somewhere.

 

[RadDave]

Re-opened thread - same issue but now on El Capitan?

On my MBPro now w/ the newest OS X, I opened AirPort Utility (AU) and saw the same warning shown in my OP a year ago, i.e. my laptop has 'lost contact' w/ my router - checked AU on my iPad Air 2 and both lights are green; also, checked my cabled iMac and all is fine - the router's green light is lit - rebooted the modem & router and the MBPro found the router - this morning same issue on the laptop (all else the same) - this time I turned Wi-Fi off on the MBPro and then on - AU showed two green lights.

I cannot imagine others are not observing this issue, but I could understand if AU is rarely opened - Interestingly, the internet is still functioning even w/ the router somewhere out there in cyberspace according to my laptop's app - I also did a DHCP lease renewal once which helped. I suspect this is some 'buggy' OS X problem related to Wi-Fi - iOS does not seem to have this issue.

SO, any similar experiences and/or thoughts - I probably should just stop opening the AU on my laptop unless the internet is not working! Dave