Mac Mini WiFi Connectivity Issues

[myosh]

I'm working on my dad's Mac Mini (Macmini4,1, 2.4 GHz C2D) because it is suddenly having problems connecting to my wireless network. I first noticed things starting to go downhill when the power went out unexpectedly a couple of weeks ago.

Since that outage, the Mac Mini began to drop the wireless network connection asking me to re-enter the WPA2 password. Once it reconnected, things would be fine for a few hours to a few days and then it would lose the connection again.

Now, the problem has gotten worse. Network Preferences shows I'm connected to the network but speeds are woefully slow. When I try to ping my wireless router (Netgear WNDR3700) I'm seeing 30-75% packet loss and ping times in excess of 6000 ms for those packets that actually make it back. To rule out the router, I brought my 2009 MacBook Pro (MacBookPro5,5) into the same room as the Mac Mini and I am able to ping the router no problem with ping times in the 2-3 ms range.

Is it possible the Airport card in the Mac Mini has gone bad (damaged during the power outage and progressively getting worse)? Is there anything else I should try? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Dangerous Theory]

I cannot imagine a power cut will have damaged the hardware. It may have caused a software issue though. Try deleting the router from your preferred network, restarting the mac and then reconnecting to the router.

 

[myosh]

Thanks for suggestion but it really didn't resolve the problem. I did as you suggested and removed my network from the Preferred Networks list, rebooted the mini and then added my network back. The first thing I did once I was reconnected was to ping my access point and while packet loss was diminished (down to around 5-10%) ping times were varied from under 100 ms to over 8000 ms.

One thing I had to in order for the mini to connect to my network was to turn on SSID broadcast (it has been turned off prior to me turning it on to add the mini). With the SSID broadcast turned off, my Mac Mini wouldn't connect even when I try to connect to it manually (entering the SSID and WPA2 password myself). I found this interesting because entering the SSID and password manually used to work. FWIW, the Mac Mini is running Snow Leopard (10.6.8).

Thanks for your help.

 

[Cmd-the-World]

Just asking did you restart all your network gear the router/s and the modem? Sometimes after a power outage they might go crazy and stop working properly with one particular device only.

 

[myosh]

Hmmm... didn't think about that. I would find it incredibly odd that the wireless router would have an issue with one specific device and not the others on the network. I have two TiVos, my MacBook Pro, an iPhone 4 and an iPad all wirelessly connected to this access point and none of them had problems.

FWIW, I fixed the problem last night by going into my router and setting the channel number instead of using the automatic setting. For whatever reason, that resolved the problem.

Thanks for all the help guys.

 

[misist25]

Setting the channel number works.

FWIW, I fixed the problem last night by going into my router and setting the channel number instead of using the automatic setting. For whatever reason, that resolved the problem.

That resolved my issue, too. Thanks, myosh.

 

[elolaugesen]

When i installed mountain lion on two machines wifi slowed down in both of the places we use. Different networks, different routers. Changed channel from 11 to 9. Problem fixed.

Cheers. Elo