Airport connection problems

G

guapagirl

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Hope this is in the right place!

I have 3 powerbooks on an airport connection, but one is no longer working properly. It says it is turned on, but it isn't receiving the signal or connecting to the server. It has been configuered identically to the other two.

I'm thinking it's either a faulty aerial or airport card. If it is one of these things, how easy is it to fix? We live in the sticks and the only Mac guy we had, has just jacked it all in (due to overwork!). The school budget is pretty stretched as well, so posting it off to London to be fixed by Apple is probably out of the question unless it would be a cheap job.

Any ideas? (or better yet, any members in the Lands End area who could do it?)

Cheers, Liz :)
 
Can you connect via ethernet? Just wondering, so you can rule out non-Airport network issues.

And it sounds silly, but if you can determine for sure that the wireless card is at fault, and there's no one around to fix it, the cheapest option is buying a wireless PCMCIA adapter like this.

There are articles describing how to replace the card yourself, but this may fall under the category of "things I'd rather not do". If you want to give it a shot, a new Airport Extreme card is about US $80.
 
Cheers, I hadn't thought about trying it via the ethernet. I'll check that when I get chance. I reckon that I could change the card given the instructions you linked if that*is the problem.

So you think that if it works via the internet then it is the airport card? Not the aerial/ antenna? Hope so!

Liz :)
 
Where are the three (or currently two) powerbooks connecting to? A router? What settings do you have on the router? WEP? MAC?
I think your powerbook will work fine with the ethernet cable plugged. But this still doesn't prove that the airport card is damaged. Make sure you turn off any kind of security settings on the routing unit. Sometimes resetting the router (if used) helps to get the default options back (maximum compatibility) and also fixes some connectivity issues. Give it a try before worrying about reparations.
 
Hi Zammy-Sam, They are connecting to a netgear wireless access point. the IT tec says all the settings are the same on all three and gave the old "I thought these were supposed to be better than PCs bit". I can't fiddle with the router because I don't have any passwords and I don't know what I'm doing :? Just off to try connecting to the ethernet cables and then I'll try swapping the airport cards around to see if that makes a difference.

Report back soon! I may be some time :D
 
You should ask your IT techs, if their wireless network is using any security options such as MAC-adress filters, wifi encryption such as WEP or WPA and fixed IP-adresses. "The same settings on all three" is no guarantee for proper network connections.
Of course, the problem might be due to a faulty airport card, but I rather think it's because of some network problems. I often heard ppl considering damaged hardware when there was only a missed entrie in the MAC-filter list or so.
Waiting for your report.. ;)
 
...and I'm still waiting for the IT (or should that be PC?) guy. A weird thing happened on thursday. I thought I'd try connecting it to the ethernet via the cable we use for the emacs, but I noticed that it had an airport signal. I got the others out to make sure that I hadn't got them mixed up and sure enough, they were all connecting to the internet!

I downloaded a load of software updates and packed it away at the end of the day. Next day nothing! Dead as the proverbial. :confused:

Anyway I plugged it in via the emac ethernet cable and nothing happend, though I didn't really expect it to. I'm sure I would need to change other settings than the ethernet/airport.

I think I ought to train to become an Apple technician :?
 
I had somewhat similar problems that had a completely illogical solution (at least illogical to me).

One of the machines on my home network would often disconnect, airport would disappear, others machines unaffected.

After much frustration, I did the following- in the Airport admin utility, I turned OFF interference robustness, set station density to LOW, and switched back to channel 11-worked perfectly for 3 weeks now. I think somehow it was related to interference from neighbors wireless networks which were as stong as my own at the problem machine. One would think all of this would have made my problem worse, but it fixed it. More details in my own post from about January 15 or 16....

But this is very easy to do, so it might be worth a test.

Good luck!

Ron
 
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