Periodic loss of PowerBook Wi-Fi connectivity

mleacock · #1 November 28th, 2005, 02:53 AM

My PowerBook will lose it's valid IP address and consequently the connection (APIPA sets in and the router's DHCP service does not assign a valid IP address) to my Linksys WR54G router after re-awakening from sleep. Resetting the router and cable modem helps temporarily but as I let it sleep tonight and wake tomorrow to use the computer, it will not be able to connect and will have a 169. . . . address when I check the newtork settings.

I recall when I spoke with an Apple support guru some time ago that he ran me through a set of surgical Library file deletions that corrected the problem for a few happy months . . .but it is back and I'd like to know if it is some sort of keychain issue, cacheing issue or just that the Airport card within the notebook and the Linksys don't want to play nice.

I have an AirPort Experss as a repeater off of the Linksys; does that matter? The problem first surfaced with the stock OS X 10.3 (Panther) set-up and has now reared its ugly head with my upgrade to Tiger (2 months ago).

Any advice would be greatly appreciated

Regards,

Mo

nixgeek · #2 November 28th, 2005, 09:59 AM

Are you up to 10.4.3? Have you tried running OnyX to see if maybe it's a resident file that you didn't catch?

Normally the NIC will lose the address when it's in sleep mode, but it should get it back once it comes out of it.

sgould · #3 November 28th, 2005, 01:14 PM

Don't know whether it's the right thing, but when I was losing the connection frequently I changed the DHCP lease time from the default 4 hrs to 24 hrs. It seems to have helped and I hardly lose the signal now.

It's in Airport Admin Utility/Network

Before then the solution seemed to be putting the Modem, Airport and Ethernet hub power supplies through the same wall socket. When it failed I switched it on and off. It then started OK.

mleacock · #4 November 30th, 2005, 11:51 AM

I've used OnyX and flushed out the caches etc. I've deleted any keychain files that I found. The machine will keep an IP address in and out of sleep, but needs me to enter the WEP key every time I leave and re-enter my home network (it had asked before if I wanted to store the key on the keychain but there seems to not be that option this time).

Is there a way to recreate a fresh keychain?

Regards, Maurice