I have a new DELL inspiron e1505 with an 802.11b/802.11g wireless NIC along with a 2Wire 802.11g router.
My inspiron was having issues connecting consistently with my wireless gateway. Slow connection, varying speeds, eventual disconnects.
After changing the channel on my Router to 1, i've noticed great performance and reliability. My concern is that I don't want to bring my laptop to another location and not be able to connect because they router is setup for channel 11, which is very common.
Has anyone else experienced this?? If so, what did you do? why does this happen on such a new laptop?
You could have interference on channel 11 at that location. Try it at another location that is known to work with a different laptop to see if it's a laptop or location (or router) problem.
christopher snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com hath wroth:
Yes, I've seen something like this.
The problem showed up in about 2001(?) with a laptop and a PCMCIA card. (Names and models intentionally withheld). The FCC type certification tests require that emission be measured on all channels. During the dry run, someone discovered that the PCMCIA card would not talk reliably to the access point on one channel. Same symptoms as what you describe. They could get a connection, but it would be slow and eventually disconnect. All the other channels worked just fine.
The problem was that it wasn't always the same channel. Depending on what the laptop was doing, the affected channel would vary. One channel would magically be cured, only to have another adjacent channel become un-useable.
I got involved in the troubleshooting and eventually traced the problem to RFI (radio interference) generated by the laptop. The type certification was for the combined laptop and PCMCIA card, so I had to use this particular laptop. I deteremined that most of the crud was being radiated by un-bypassed power leads around the CPU power regulator. Some ferrite beads, bypass caps, and a ground or two, eliminated the problem.
I'm not sure if this is the same problem you're experiencing. From your description, methinks it's highly likely. You will probably see the same effect with other access points using channel 11. I can't offer a fix, but possibly a workaround. Many laptops have power saving features which slow down the CPU clock. Put your laptop in one of these modes, and if the RFI is coming from the CPU, it should temporarily eliminate the problem.
Another experiment you can try (that I couldn't) is to play with the antennas going to the MiniPCI card. If the antennas are picking up the crud they might be moved or adjusted to minimize the effect. Try disconnecting BOTH antennas from the MiniPCI card. Move close to the access point and see if channel 11 works. If it does, reconnect only the AUX antenna, and try again. Then, disconnect it, and try the MAIN antenna. The idea is to see which antenna picks up the least amount of RFI (if it's coming in via the antenna). Also try reversing the antenna connections. I'm not sure this will solve the problem, but it's easy enough to try. Oh, be careful with the tiny u-FL connectors. They break very easily and will not survive many insertion/removal cycles.
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