Very, very confusing/frustrating wireless problem! (frequent drops)

[Rob_B]

Ok, I give up, I need help! My wireless network is giving me grief, to explain...

I have a laptop with wifi & a PC with a USB adapter or PCI card (just bought the PCI card thinking it would fix my problem but nope!)

Ok, so very, very frequently my connection just *drops*, the router is still connected but my laptop cannot load up any pages, I turn wireless off/on & this usually fixes the problem. Sometimes it comes back straight away, other times I have to leave it for half an hour (or however long I can do something else for) for it to come back. Problem with the laptop you think?

No, my PC does the same however the disconnects/reconnects are seconds apart, I cannot get online at all with my PC (signal strength is fine) I'm sitting here now watching it flick between connected & *no signal*

Router problem you think?

No, I have a Sky router & a Belkin router, the same happens no matter which I use.

The only constant is my line however I fail to see how this can affect my wireless signal when wired connections (my Xbox) work fine all the time.

There are other connections in the area (2 or 3) I've tried changing the channel, tried turning the 'protection' on but no difference.

I'm stumped, there is nothing i've not changed so what can it be? My next idea is to download Netstumbler & see what the connection looks like, I don't think this will help as it'll just confirm what i'm seeing now but I'm running out of ideas fast!

Any ideas guys? You'll save me a breakdown if this can be fixed!

[Jay]

do you have any cordless phones?

[Rob_B]

Yep, DECT, worked fine before so assumed this wouldn't affect it! Maybe that was a mistake!

[Rob_B]

Ok, so its not the DECT phone! Still looking!

[peterb]

I take it it doesn't happen with a wired connection to the router - it ios definately a wireless problem?

[hippoman]

sounds like a wireless problem with the router.

try upating the firmware on the router.

update wireless adapter drivers on your client machines.

Try changing the encryption on your connection (from wep to wpa/psk or visa versa (or even test with an open connection).

Try turning dhcp off on the router and setting ip address manually.

It is likely a modern router will be using 802.11b and 802.11g frequency ranges. Try forcing it to only use one and then the other. (you have already tried changing the channel but maybe a neighbour's router is cycling through all channels and interfering).

If possible try forcing both router and adapter transmitters to full power.

wireless can be a bit pants at times. I usually find running a "repair" on your connection is a quicker and more reliable way of getting it back up than manually dis/re-enabling.

Try the above one at a time and see if there is any improvement.

[countzerouk]

You could also try changing the wireless channel on the router. It's possible that someone close by is using the same or near channel, also some channels may not be as affected by local interefence

[v3n]

Yep the channel is important for removing noise from busy signals, whats the signal strength?

[Rob_B]

I've already changed channels, no difference Signal is about 50% (V thick walls!), quality is always pretty high eg 70%ish (for the few seconds I have it!)

I've got two routers as mentioned so doubt its a firmware issue, only does this over wireless connects, wired is flawless.
I've set power on the adapters to full, tried forcing G.

I'll have to try...

Try changing the encryption on your connection (from wep to wpa/psk or visa versa (or even test with an open connection).

Try turning dhcp off on the router and setting ip address manually.


Strange thing is that on my laptop when I turn the wifi off/on to get it to reconnect it pops up 'connected to XXX (unsecured)' however security is definately on & even shows as such if i immediately click on the network...

Thanks for the ideas, I'll report back!

[tsj]

Have you tried using a different channel? It could be interference?

[hippoman]

what is your ssid? is it still the default name for the router (eg belkin 56k, linksys etc)?
If it is you may be connecting to a neighbour's unsecured network with the same ssid. Change ssid to something individual.

[Rob_B]

Have you tried using a different channel? It could be interference?

Yes, as I've noted in previous posts.

SSID is not the same as anyone elses.

I've changed to WEP from WPA & my laptop seems fine now but will give it another few days to make sure!
Main PC now doesn't get a signal (I changed to a smaller aerial on my router) so I'm just gonna give up & buy homeplugs!

[j1979]

my house mate has same probplem,

turned out to be BBC iPlayer that was cauing all the dropouts

[Rob_B]

Changing to WEP seems to have fixed it, signal is poor on my PC anyway due to the distance so I'm getting some homeplugs for that (plus homeplugs are faster than wireless anyway!)

cheers for the ideas guys.

[hippoman]

glad it's working better... now for the bad news...

wep is not secure. it can be sniffed and cracked very quickly instructions here.

Its secure enough to stop must people from trying to access your network but will not stop someone who knows what they are doing.

[Rob_B]

glad it's working better... now for the bad news...

wep is not secure. it can be sniffed and cracked very quickly instructions here.

Its secure enough to stop must people from trying to access your network but will not stop someone who knows what they are doing.

I'm well aware of that but unless I want access for 5 minutes a day it's my best bet. Will turn on MAC filtering as well but appreciate this is just a minor annoyance to anyone who desired access! My only saving grace is also one thing I've comlained about, my walls are so thick that it's only my neighbours aove/below me that could do this due to signal strength & neither are the master-hacker kind!