|
|
05-03-2008, 07:51 PM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
Apple WiFi Sucks :-P
Hey guys I'm really puzzled...
Today I bought Airport Extreme for my G4 iMac and I've to say that it sucks compared to the PC laptop (from Asus).
The iMac WiFi - in the same position of the laptop - doesn't pick almost any of the network I've around and if does they connection last short time. While the WiFi of the laptop picks many more connections and they are stable..
Can someone explain me why? Same problem on my girlfriend's iMac in another suburb.
Or maybe I need an extra application? Or is the Airport Extreme that is weak?
Thanks!!!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 08:29 PM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Adelaide
|
Make sure the antenna cable is attached properly, it can look connected but not be fully inserted. It can take a lot of force to get it to snap in place properly.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 09:10 PM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
Quote:
Originally Posted by MightyAtom
Make sure the antenna cable is attached properly, it can look connected but not be fully inserted. It can take a lot of force to get it to snap in place properly.
|
Yep, it is well connected and you are right, it takes a bit of force to snap it in.
But it is in properly otherwise it wouldn't work... and the iMac of my girfriend comes with wifi and she found the same issue. The wifi of the PC laptop works better than the one in the iMac.
Any idea? |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 09:14 PM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Streaky Bay, South Australia
|
Wow, strange...
My MacBook's WiFi seems better than my PC using buddies, and even my friends *newer* MacBook.
Though havent had any experience with the iMacs, so can't help you there I'm afraid.
__________________
MacBook White (Mid '07) // iPhone 3G 16GB Black
iPod Touch 1st Gen 8GB // AirPort Express Early 2008 (pre-n)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 09:15 PM
|
|
Still stuck in 1984
Group: Regulars
Location: Inside your head
|
Windows handles the patchiness inherent in wifi much much better than MacOS X can. Windows uses a much higher 'time to live' value and has better error correction and retransmission procedures. In short, it is much more fault-tolerant than Apple's implementation.
if you have an Intel Mac, you can confirm this yourself by using Boot Camp to allow Windows XP to take over the machine and use its wireless network drivers and TCP stack instead of Apple's sorry effort.
Short of switching to a cabled connection (wifi just sucks in general, no matter who makes it) there's basically nothing you can do about it.
__________________
Tune into Psymbiensis, 24/7 chill music streaming straight to your desktop.
Cornell Univiersity says, "Watching TV shows makes you stupid." Break the addiction, visit White Dot today.
Wi-fi is a health risk, please use sparingly and with caution. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 09:16 PM
|
|
NSLog(@"%@", [self customTitle]);
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
Does the PC laptop have 802.11n? 802.11n has better reception, even if the "other end" doesn't have 802.11n. Is the wi-fi in the iMac G4 802.11b, or 802.11g?
__________________
"A company must go out and find what the customer wants ... The need is not for, say, half a million ¼-inch drill bits. The needs is that there are ten million ¼-inch holes that need to be drilled." - Robert Noyce
"Algorithms that forget their history are doomed to repeat it" - Artificial Intelligence, A Modern Approach (Russel & Norvig)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 09:21 PM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Adelaide
|
How far away is the router, is there anything in between that could cause interference or block the signal?
Have you tried changing the channel on the router to see if reception is effected?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 09:51 PM
|
|
MacTalk Podcaster
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
On the mac try turning off "Use interference robustness".
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 10:11 PM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
My friend had the EXACT same problem. Did all sorts of things to try and get it working. eventually I took it out and put it back in. There was a 2nd click for hte antenna.
Push it in then PUSH IT IN FURTHER it worked for me and my mates laptop is going gret guns.
__________________
Sick of Bullshit? Go here
www.youngausskeptics.com
iBook 14'' 1GB Ram, MBP(santa) 15" 4GB ram, iPod Nano(3G) 4gb, iPod shuffle 512mb, iPod Touch 8gb. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05-03-2008, 11:02 PM
|
|
Pork Hunt
Group: Regulars
Location: Perth
|
I had a similar issue on an old g3 imac i had a couple of years back. It was the connection - i had to reinstall the card and connect the antenna hard and everything was fixed. I had really good single and decent range, it never drop the connection once after that
__________________
Don't you just love standards, there are so many to choose from!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
06-03-2008, 12:32 AM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Puckapunyal
|
qwerty-slam it... smash it... hurt it... one more push... a bit more, britney will release a song about it, surely sure... tight fit technology...
__________________
iBook G4 1GB 10.5.4
iPod nano 4GB
iPhone 3G 16GB black
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
06-03-2008, 07:42 AM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
Macosxhints has a possible fix for this.
Seems it has had some success. At least it explains what might be happening.
macosxhints.com - A possible fix for very slow AirPort transfer speeds |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
06-03-2008, 08:27 AM
|
|
MacTalk Podcaster
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
detail beat me to it:
Quote:
After installing a new drive and reinstalling 10.5.2, I set about copying key files and programs back to the machine. However, my AirPort performance was glacially slow: time estimates to copy 70MB of data were in excess of 45 minutes! Some Google searching told me that I was not alone. Apparently this is a pretty big issue for many people on 10.5.2, but it's not universal -- our MacBook Pro, for instance, sees no such slowdowns.
That linked thread from Apple Discussions contains a potential fix. John Albergo theorized that it might be related to the TCP setting for "delayed_ack", and offered this one-line Terminal solution:
sudo sysctl -w net.inet.tcp.delayed_ack=0
The default setting is three; the above command changes it to zero until the next restart. (For a permanent fix, John linked to this blog post that contains a Startup Item to run the above command at each boot.)
I tested it last night, and it worked perfectly on our troublesome PowerBook -- AirPort speeds returned to normal immediately after running the command. Theoretically, setting delayed_ack to zero is a Bad Thing, especially on a slower network. However, I transferred over 250MB worth of stuff (both data and applications) last night, and everything worked perfectly. Note that others have reported that the fix didn't work for them, but many people are reporting success.
In my case, I've chosen not to install the startup item -- assuming Apple figures out the real cause of this problem and fixes it in 10.5.3, I don't want to have to remember to remove the startup item. The PowerBook is only ever restarted for software updates, so I've just put the command into a simple one-line script for easy running when needed after the occasional restart.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
06-03-2008, 03:04 PM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
Wooow! So many responses! Thanks a lot to you all guys!!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Brains
Windows handles the patchiness inherent in wifi much much better than MacOS X can. Windows uses a much higher 'time to live' value and has better error correction and retransmission procedures. In short, it is much more fault-tolerant than Apple's implementation.
|
Yep, I guess is the right picture... do you know why?
Quote:
|
if you have an Intel Mac, you can confirm this yourself by using Boot Camp to allow Windows XP to take over the machine and use its wireless network drivers and TCP stack instead of Apple's sorry effort.
|
Ok, will do the test on my girlfriend iMac!
Quote:
|
Short of switching to a cabled connection (wifi just sucks in general, no matter who makes it) there's basically nothing you can do about it.
|
Haha... ok.. 
Quote:
Originally Posted by forgie
Does the PC laptop have 802.11n? 802.11n has better reception, even if the "other end" doesn't have 802.11n. Is the wi-fi in the iMac G4 802.11b, or 802.11g?
|
Not sure about it...  How do I check?
Quote:
Originally Posted by MightyAtom
How far away is the router, is there anything in between that could cause interference or block the signal?
Have you tried changing the channel on the router to see if reception is effected?
|
No routers at he moment, just picking signals around to check the strenght of the Airport compared to the laptop pc...
Quote:
Originally Posted by scottgrot
On the mac try turning off "Use interference robustness".
|
What is this? How do I do that?
Quote:
Originally Posted by detail
|
Ok, will give a read... Thanks!
Tried that string... still sucks...
Tried to move the iMac everywhere, still sucks...
Really Apple is so cool why does the bloody WiFi sucks compared to the WiFi in the 2 years old basic Asus laptop?
Last edited by Currawong; 07-03-2008 at 01:37 PM.
Reason: Merged 7 posts...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
06-03-2008, 05:43 PM
|
|
Regular
Group: Regulars
Location: Melbourne
|
How old is this 'laptop'?
it may be using a newer wifi card..
|
|
|
|
|
|
