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WIFI drops every 30 seconds on one admin account but works perfect on other account??

M

MBM007

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 6, 2006
145
1
Boulder
For the past 2 weeks the wifi on my iMac (27in 3.4ghz i7) has constantly cut in and out after the 7.6.3 update for the Airport Extreme was installed which resulted in trouble for all devices in the house (ipad, iphones, Apple TV, mac mini, mb pro,) so I rolled it back that same day 2 weeks ago to 7.6.1 and everything has worked fine besides my imac which picks up a connection for 30 seconds and then drops out (in airport utility the internet keeps going amber/green/amber etc) Worst part about this is that right before it drops it locks up the entire network so all the other devices wifi doesn't work....so i have to shut off the wifi on the iMac to allow the devices to connect.

Figured 10.8.3 may address the issue so I only used my iMac for photo editing, which is ridiculous, but I installed 10.8.3 when I saw it posted yesterday and the issue persists. I tried every damn fix I could find (returned router to factory settings, created new network, changed MTU, channel, keychain access, repaired disk permissions, etc, etc) and wasted the day and this morning ***** with this!

Finally decided to create another admin account and the internet hasn't dropped for an hour....which is unreal after the hell the other account has had! Don't know what got corrupted but I've been digging in the console and see mdnsresponder messages and other crap that leads me to not even want to mess with the account anymore. I've wasted countless hours reading about possible solutions but I'm now just glad to have a Working wifi signal on my iMac.

TO THE POINT: Whats the most efficient way to move stuff I've acquired over the past 10+ years of using a mac to a new admin WITHOUT bringing whatever is causing this wifi issue along?? I'm lazy and stupid so I've just migrated from a Powerbook G4 I had in 2003 to a MacBook Pro in 2007 and then ultimately to this iMac in 2011....so I know I've drug a lot of un-needed crap along in these 10 years!
 
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Has anyone had anything like this happen? Figured deleting airport passwords out of the keychain, repairing/verifying the permissions, and deleting the wifi connection out of network preferences on the new admin account and then relogging in and adding the wifi network would correct any problems.
Boggles my mind what is preventing a stable wifi connection on this account....I've now had a steady connection on the new admin for 2+ hours
 
What happened is you did and "Upgrade" and the transfer of old data was moved to your new 10.8.x upgrade from your old wireless data.

1. Quit airport.
2. Navigate to System Preferences->Network tab and look at the top of the pane at "Location:" with a toggle bar. Use that to 'Edit Locations' and select that.
3. In the Edit ;location pop-up click on + button to add a new Network Location calling it what ever you want (i.e. Home, Work, School, etc.) and click 'done button.
4. While still in the Network pane click on the bottom word 'Apply' to completely save your new Location.
5. Using the Network pane to rejoin your wireless network.
6. Download the free application iStumbler beta and see if another wireless is on the same wireless channel as you are. If there is then change the channel number in your wireless router to be different (to cut down on cross talk).
7. See if these steps help and let us know.
 
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satcomer said:
What happened is you did and "Upgrade"!
Click to expand...

I'm stupid and for some reason normally upgrade all my software the second it drops and most times regret it.
Don't understand would could have changed on this iMac by upgrading the Airport Extreme to 7.6.3 for a couple hours and then rolling it back to 7.6.1? Yesterday I did a factory restart of the airport extreme and even created a brand new wifi network so its running 7.6.1 without any of my saved settings.

I'm trying to think of anything else out of the ordinary I did the past 2 weeks and I guess I did stoop to downloading a video torrent I couldn't find on newsgroups and that was the 1st time I've torrented in about 8 years....possible to have malware in a .mkv file that does something to my wifi connection?
 
Last edited:
MBM007 said:
I'm stupid and for some reason normally upgrade all my software the second it drops and most times regret it.
Don't understand would could have changed on this iMac by upgrading the Airport Extreme to 7.6.3 for a couple hours and then rolling it back to 7.6.1? Yesterday I did a factory restart of the airport extreme and even created a brand new wifi network so its running 7.6.1 without any of my saved settings.

I guess I did stoop to downloading a video torrent I couldn't find on newsgroups and that was the 1st time I've torrented in about 8 years....possible to have malware in a .mkv file?
Click to expand...

Well with most malwares on OS X try to adjust an OS x user's DNS setting and Host file.

IMHO you should dump your ISPs DNS and go with something like Google Publis DNS or OpenDNS (I know open DNS uses PhishTank to block known Trojan hosting sites) and change the DNS in your router.
 
satcomer said:
Well with most malwares on OS X try to adjust an OS x user's DNS setting and Host file.

IMHO you should dump your ISPs DNS and go with something like Google Publis DNS or OpenDNS (I know open DNS uses PhishTank to block known Trojan hosting sites) and change the DNS in your router.
Click to expand...

how do I go about seeing if my DNS or host file have been modified?

Does this sound like malware or a case of incorrect info being sent to the router? Weird that it connects, works, maxes out the network, drops and then reconnects over and over and over
 
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