Possible interference?

By AshJ
in Smart Home, Network & Security

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Neowinian

AshJ

Posted
Posted

I have a strange problem. I have multiple things hooked up to my LAN using my Actiontec Q1000 wireless router. They go as follows:

(Living Room)Wii - Wireless

(Living Room)XBox 360 - Wireless

(Living Room)Sony Bravia Home Theater System - Wireless

(Living Room)Windows 7 PC - Wireless

(Living Room)Mac OS X 10.6.3 - Wireless(airport)

(Usually in Living Room)Windows Vista laptop - Wireless

(Office)Windows XP PC - Wired

(Office)Windows 2000 Professional - Wired

I have a job working at home and have recently had to relocate the router in my office due to media requirements, meaning my work computer has to be connected via Ethernet cable to the router. It was previously in the Living Room, near the Windows 7 and Mac OS systems. The router is configured with an SSID and WPA password that has been the same since it was hooked up(I immediately personalized both, so I am not using the default Qwest SSID/WPA). When I relocated the router, all items previously on my network connected fine with the router settings that were in place prior to moving it, except that the Airport on my Mac was not picking up the network at all. The airport has since randomly seen the network and the signal strength will show 3 bars when it does. This morning it was working fine all day until the afternoon and it started doing the same thing again. I came to the realization that the only time my Mac wouldn't see the network is when my husband is playing the XBox 360 using the wireless controllers. I had him connect the controller instead of using it wirelessly and my Mac saw the network again. I had him do it a couple more times and the same thing happened. The 360 is on the network, but that doesn't seem to affect my Mac; it's only when he is using the controller wirelessly that it interferes. The weird thing is, the Windows 7 machine is right beside the Mac and connects wirelessly without interruption. I'm not completely knowledgable about how interference and frequencies work, but a game console controller interfering with the Airport on my Mac sounds very strange. I would think there would be standards used for frequencies like most other things, and I don't know why the controller would operate on the same frequency as the wireless network, but like I said I am not knowledgeable on that kind of thing at all. To my knowledge, I should be able to solve this issue or at least isolate the problem a couple of ways. IE, use a wireless network adapter on the Mac instead of Airport, set the Actiontec or another router up as a bridge, or change the channel of my router. I'm studying for my CCENT at the moment and have ok knowledge on networks in general, but this is a problem I've not encountered before and there's not a lot of information I can find out about it online. I did download Network Stumbler to try to check out the channel situation, but it doesn't support any of the 3 networking adapters I have on my laptop(NVIDIA nForce Networking Controller, Netgear WG111v3 Wireless-G USB Adapter, and Atheros AR5007 802.11b/g WiFi Adapter). I'm going to try and install it on one of my other machines and I guess it would be more accurate to install it on my Mac anyway though I don't think there's support for Mac as far as NetStumbler goes. I also downloaded Wireshark, but it seems a bit more idiot proof than NetStumbler, lol. I found a forum on here that suggested Vistumbler and it worked great. Anyone have any info that would be helpful for me? Also, anyone know of a program similar to NetStumbler and Vistumbler that is user friendly and works with the devices I have? Thanks in advance.

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https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/903726-possible-interference/
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Grand Master

Sikh

Posted
Posted

The controllers do run on 2.4ghz wireless range i believe. If so they CAN be an interference and sound like it in your case, but at the same time the windows 7 PC does fine so idk.

Maybe the airport drivers need to be updated or its just the airport isnt strong enough to kill the interference like the windows 7 card can?

Neowinian

AshJ

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  On 23/05/2010 at 03:28, Sikh said:

The controllers do run on 2.4ghz wireless range i believe. If so they CAN be an interference and sound like it in your case, but at the same time the windows 7 PC does fine so idk.

Maybe the airport drivers need to be updated or its just the airport isnt strong enough to kill the interference like the windows 7 card can?

Would changing the router channel help this problem at all or is the 2.4 referring to something else? If that wouldn't solve the problem, is the only fix setting up a bridge with my Actiontec router or using a USB adapter? I have never had to set one up a bridge and am not familiar with the implementation of it as far as settings go. Problem is that my work computer, which is in another room entirely, must stay wired and I'm not willing to run that much cat5 around my house. I don't know enough about frequencies to know if the 2.4ghz would be affected by changing the router channel. According to Vistumbler, my router is operating on Channel 1. The router settings are set to Auto in the Channel settings, but I'm not sure if that means it automatically picks a channel or it randomly changes the channel. Is there a way to set up Vistumbler(or another program) to pick up devices likes the PCs and game consoles as well or is it just the broadcasting device channel that matters?

I went to Best Buy and explained the situation to them because I was looking for a wireless network adapter compatible with Mac, because all of the requirements stated Windows was needed and he was saying that if the Windows 7 machine is working fine then it is probably the hardware in the Mac, but I am inclined to disagree. I know they use the same basic protocols when it comes to networking, but I'm not exactly sure what the specifications on the Airport. Plus, the Windows 7 machine is using some antenna thing that I've never seen before. We got the Windows 7 HP machine like a couple of months ago and it came with two ports on the back that look like small coax connectors and you hook up the antenna thing to it, which allows the PC to pick up wireless networks. Perhaps that picks up better signal than the Airport? My laptop is Vista and has a wireless card in it and it works fine as well. It's not so new, either; probably about 2 years old. It is usually in the same room as the Mac. I'm not sure, I just know this is a weird issue and because it's an iMac, I'm hoping it isn't a hardware issue. I really don't feel like sending it in for repair, :-\. I'm sure the stumbler software would be more accurate on my Mac, esp with the differences in signal strength, but I am not sure of a similar program that has a Mac version.

Grand Master

Sikh

Posted
Posted

NEVER GO TO BEST BUY EVER. THERE RETARDS. All of geek squad has become is the "get your computer technical degree in 6 months, call us now! This field needs prople everyday". That's all there people are now. When they started off it was good now it's anyone who can sell and call those advertised peice of **** "schools".

Now just use net stumbler like budman posted and change your channel outside of that range.

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