Wireless Issues

[mhubbard24]

I have a Netgear MR314 wireless router I use to dhare my Bellsouth DSL connection. It has been in use about 2 months now. All of a sudden about a week ago, my laptop will all of sudden disonnect from the network. It does this from time to time, maybe once a day. Seems more frequent when coming off standby but it happens even after a frsh boot sometimes too. My signal strength is always high when this happens. I cannot ping anything local or remote. The wirelss card is a Netgear MA401. I use Windows 2000 on my laptop. Anyone run across this?

[craigmodius]

the first thing I would zero in on is the power management/sleep mode thing. I always disable a nic's power management (http://support.earthlink.net/mu/1/psc/img/walkthroughs/broadband/DSL/win/5498.psc.html) to keep the network card from going to sleep on me.

next you could look at minimizing 802.11 interference issues (http://www.80211-planet.com/tutorials/article.php/953511) such as if you have a 2.4 ghz phone nearby it could be causing disconnects. or check any other tutorials on 802.11 Planet's Tutorials Section (http://www.80211planet.com/tutorials/)

And of course downloading the latest drivers for your NIC is a good tried and true practice

good luck, and keep us posted.

[Archangel42069]

...a bad nic...

Next time it d/c's, go to the start menu/run and typ "cmd". At the command prompt, type "ipconfig/all" if the ip address isn't 192.168.x.x, unless you have it set up differently, you may have a bad nic.

[mhubbard24]

Thanks for the replies. I am gonna try the new drivers, havent done that yet. It happened twice today and a reboot didnt even resolve the problem. I had to reboot the router and that solved it. After it disconnects i check ipcong /all and it gives me 192.168.0.2 which is right. Loopback ping works. I can ping myself. Wireless act light on router shows activity as well as the configuration utility form the laptop, just cant get to any devices on the network or vice versa. Will try the driver update first and respond when finished.

[Gollo]

run over to netstumbler.com (http://www.netstumbler.com) and install netstumbler and see if there is any other AP's in the area. Your computer could be disconnection from your ap and connecting to an ap near by. If it is the first thing I would do is change the channel on your ap. Just a thought.

[mhubbard24]

I found out that I have the latest drivers installed already. I will change channels and see how that works too. I mean it has to be something that all of a sudden started because it had worked flawlessly for a month or so. Thansk again.

[craigmodius]

it could even be your neighbors 2.4 ghz phone for that matter try channels 3,6, and 11 two of those three are supposed to be the ones that are out of the range that the phone is using, but I don't remember which 2 off the top of my head.

even if you have the latest nic drivers, reinstalling them couldn't hurt.

after that as Archangel says it could be a bad nic.

[mhubbard24]

Ok I changed to channel 5 and the problem has seemed to go away. Now you mentioned the 2.4ghz portable phones, I am looking at buying a couple of these for my house. How do I keep interference from those away from my woreless network?

Thanks

[craigmodius]

Well to keep those 2.4 ghz phones from interfering with your existing AP do what you've been doing. Change the AP over to a channel that works well with them.

It's going to require some trial and error, but you should be OK, or just go with a 900mhz phone.

It is my understanding that the 2.4ghz Digital spread spectrum phones constantly hop frequencies to maintain clear communication and maintain privacy from eavesdroppers. (remember the tales of the old 900mhz phones and people hearing their neighbor talking on the phone)

If you buy one and read the technical details included in the owner's manual it should say what frequency range it is using and then you could choose a channel outside of that range.

Or use the trial and error method which is more straitforward.

I can't get much from Netgear's site, but here's a couple things from the Linksys KB...

P R O B L E M

I have a 2.4 GHz wireless phone, will it interfere with my 802.11b wireless system?

S O L U T I O N

2.4 GHz wireless phones can cause interference, with your wireless network. Normally symptoms will be sudden loss of wireless connectivity when the phone is in use, or drastically reduced speeds. If any of these things occur then you can try changing the channel on your phone. If your phone is unable to change channels, then you can do one of the following:

A) Hang up the phone and pick it up again. This will usually force the phone to use a different channel.

B) Change the channel on the Access Point and/or Router. This is not recommended because most phones switch channels when you end a call and start a new one. If you choose to implement this option though, Linksys advises that you use channel 1, 6 or 11. If you need help with switching channels please see article number KB10934337, "Changing the SSID and Channel on a WAP11 and BEFW11S4"

R E F E R E N C E C A T E G O R Y

What frequencies are used to operate Instant Wireless equipment?

R E F E R E N C E

Instant Wireless equipment uses DSSS [Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum] technology. In North America, 11 channels are available. The breakdown of the frequencies is as follows:

Channel 1 - 2.412GHz
Channel 2 - 2.417GHz
Channel 3 - 2.422GHz
Channel 4 - 2.427GHz
Channel 5 - 2.432GHz
Channel 6 - 2.437GHz
Channel 7 - 2.442GHz
Channel 8 - 2.447GHz
Channel 9 - 2.452GHz
Channel 10 - 2.457GHz
Channel 11 - 2.462GHz

[Bubbarosa]

I had a similar problem and i do have a 2.4 gz phone in the house. I changed the wireless channel to channel 1 and the problem went away. Netstumbler shows another wirless on the same channel I was using also so who know which one was the cause. Happy now. Make sure you enable WEP on your wireless!!

[Gollo]

Originally posted by Bubbarosa
I had a similar problem and i do have a 2.4 gz phone in the house. I changed the wireless channel to channel 1 and the problem went away. Netstumbler shows another wirless on the same channel I was using also so who know which one was the cause. Happy now. Make sure you enable WEP on your wireless!!

Netstumbler only shows 802.11b AP's (or NIC's set to adhoc mode) so your neighbor probably has wireless too.