Airport Exteme works only half the time on my new iMac!

T

thendis

Registered
I recently got my shiny new iMac G5 20", which I have fallen in love with. Unfortunately the honeymoon is over, and we are having our first fight.

I took my Airport extreme card out of my eMac and put it into the iMac. It works ok sometimes, but other times no matter what I do, it won't detect my Netgeat wireless router.

Moreover, I tried creating a computer-to-computer network, and connect to the iMac from my iBook (which has an Airport card) but it can't see it. This suggests the problem is definately the card or the iMac, and not the router.

When I do get it working, if I put the mac to sleep, it will often screw up the connection. Also, sometimes it appears in ther list, but when I try to connect it says "error connecting to Netgear network". I never had any issues like this with the eMac.

I hope this hasn't been asked before. I searched a whole lot of posts and found similar problems, but not the same. I hope it is a setting and not the hardware, I'd hate to have to return the comp for repairs.

Any help appreciated :)
 
It sounds to me like the antenna may not have been plugged in. When you do get a connection, does the signal level show OK?
 
2 to 3 bars at least. I don't think it's a weak signal problem, because my eMac never lost a signal (and the iBook is in the same place as the eMac was). Plus, my iBook G3 with an old Airport card has full bars all the time, even when placed farther away than the iBook.

The fact that I can't create a computer-to-computer network when it is playing up suggests it isn't sending or recieving.

In the words of Ned Flanders: "this is a dilly of a pickle"

Thanks for the fast reply though mate :)
 
i have a fluctuating wireless connection sometimes, I think I may have tracked it down to the location in the house (router is on the "wet wall"- lots of pipes in there), and the fact that there are cordless phones (operating in the same/similar bandwidth as router) in the area. do you have either of these?

Of course, the antenna idea sounds feasible too...
 
thanx for the help delsoljb32.

certainly possible. The wall has no pipes or anything, but there are a lot of corless phones, mobile phones etc. floating around the house. I guess I just thought seeing as the eMac worked fine when it was in the same spot, the iMac should be the same.

Then again, the Airport card slots into the front of the eMac, with a thin layer of plastic seperating it from the outside world. The iMac, on the other hand, has the card smack bang in the middle of the casing; with a motherboard, LCD screen, and thick layer of plastic seperating it from the outside world.

Does this sound plausible? Could it be the imac itself that weakens the Airport's ability to capture a signal?
 
I've fixed the problem. thought I should post what I did in case future ppl have the problem. Ridiculously simple solution.

All I had to do was to turn on "use interference robustness" in the Airport drop-down, and I haven't had a problem at all since. I didn't know what it was, so I never thought to try that when troubleshooting. Should be turned on by default, coz it rocks!

Apparently I must be getting interference from something, like a cordless phone or mobile phone or something, and this interference robustness thing somehow fixes those issues.

I got so close to returning the iMac to get it fixed. phew!

Thanks for the help guys, you sent me on the right track to figuring it out.
 
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