Airport Extreme - wireless dying?

J-blk

Hi all,

I'm having a rather annoying problem with my Airport Extreme router, which sort of seems like the wireless is dying (I've had the same problem with two Linksys routers, which both lasted less than a year each) but I'm not 100% sure yet.

I have a previous gen. 802.11n Airport Extreme with the latest 7.4.2 firmware installed. Now, I'm not sure if the problem started after I installed the latest update or not, but in the last week, all my wireless clients are disconnecting at random.

What happens is that all of a sudden, wireless just dies. The LED on the Extreme remains green, indicating no problems. My MacBook's Airport indicates that I'm still connected with no problems... But my Internet connection dies, my SMB shares disconnect, I can't see any other machine on the network - basically completely disconnected...

In Airport Utility, I can't even see the router when this happens, at least over wi-fi. If I wire my MacBook up, I can access it.

Nothing works until I power off the Extreme for a couple of minutes and power it back on - then everything works fine for some time. This has happened about four times in the last four days, but the frequency is still very odd to see any pattern.

Any ideas or is the router dying? I was hoping the Extreme would last longer than the shoddy Linksys routers I had, but it seems every damn router I get lasts about a year or so...

Sad Professor

Funny, but I've been experiencing the exact same problem with my Airport as well.

Mine is a much older model, about 6 years old, so it may be on its last legs. But the exact same thing happens. Internet just stops but the Airport menu still shows I'm connected. It's not until I bring up the Airport Utility that I realise there's a problem.

At first I thought it was my UPC modem, but the Airport seems to be culprit each time. This has been happening for a few months now and some weeks I've had to reboot it several times.

It seems okay in the last two weeks though. I did change some of my IP settings, not sure if that had anything to do with it.

Stainless_Steel

I had the very same problem on the older gen of the n extreme.

In fairness it lasted over 2 years of 24/7 on time.

Just bought a new one which I turn off during the night so should last longer.

J-blk

Sad Professor wrote: »

Funny, but I've been experiencing the exact same problem with my Airport as well.

Yep, I found some other forum posts on other sites about people having this problem but no definite solution. I may try downgrading the firmware to 7.4.1 and see what happens. I thought it was a UPC problem too originally but only realized what was going on when I couldn't reach my SMB shares/other systems - then Airport Utility also confirms that my wireless clients can't even "see" the router at that point.

Stainless_Steel wrote: »

In fairness it lasted over 2 years of 24/7 on time.

Yeah, to be fair, mine has pretty much never been switched off either since I bought it but I keep it in an area where it is well ventilated, etc and I thought it would last longer than a dirt cheap Linksys router but it seems not. It just seems odd that all routers I've had die after about a year of 24/7... I mean, my piece of junk UPC modem is now 5 years old and still working away (though ok, does not get as hot as a router anyway).

I'm just debating if I should spend the money on another Apple Airport Extreme (which besides this problem, I've been very happy with) for the cost involved or just get an el cheapo one instead...

Sad Professor

I've been running my Airport Extreme for 6 years 24/7.

Like I said though, it's been okay recently. Do you guys use DHCP or manual IPs? Because I've always been suspicious of the AEBS's handling of the former. I've generally used manual IPs for all my machines in order to simplify forwarding ports, etc.

However, I added two new devices in the last year (an iPhone and MBP) which I was too lazy to set up manual IPs for and just used DHCP. The problem seems to have stopped since I set manual IPs for both. Or perhaps the combination of manual and DHCP was the problem.

I also notice that the Airport will sometimes continue to show a device (such as laptop) as being a connected client (and it shows up in my network) long after it has been shutdown/put asleep. I'm not sure if this is normal.

I dunno. Setting up and troubleshooting routers always gives me headaches.

J-blk

Sad Professor wrote: »

Do you guys use DHCP or manual IPs? Because I've always been suspicious of the AEBS's handling of the former

Yep, I'm using DHCP but it's never given me trouble so I didn't suspect it at all. Might mess around with it over the weekend and try manual IPs instead. I'm going to try iStumbler later today and check if there are other networks in range that are using the same wireless channel or something - maybe some neighbor just got a router installed? Not sure that would cause such problems though.

I'd be very happy if my AEBS lasts 5-6 years like yours . What's really annoying me is that it's not much older than a year though and seems to be failing...

Sad Professor

When this happens, do the other machines on your network also get disconnected? Because I recall one instance where my Macbook lost connection like this and Airport Utility could no longer see the AEBS, but my iMac could. This is what made me think it was an IP problem.

J-blk

Sad Professor wrote: »

When this happens, do the other machines on your network also get disconnected?

Yep, everything wireless disconnects: my MacBook, my iPhone, my wife's Windows laptop, the PS3... everything. I have a Windows Home Server wired to the router and that doesn't seem to encounter any problems, hence why it seems like the wireless "died".

I can also hook up my MacBook via Ethernet without rebooting the AEBS and it works...