Intermittent wireless connection


  1. Posts : 4
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
       #1

    Intermittent wireless connection


    Hi all

    I would be grateful if someone could help me or point me in the right direction of a problem I’m having with intermittent wireless connection issues on my laptop. I’ve had a look through the forum for a similar issue as the one I’m having but I can’t find any answers. I have limited knowledge of wireless networks so I hope I can explain the problem well enough. Here goes...

    I recently bought an Acer Aspire 5732Z laptop (Win7 Home Prem x64) which has a Broadcom 802.11n Wireless Network Adapter. Everything seemed to be working fine for the first month - I was able to connect to my Sky Broadband Router (using WPA security) without any problems.

    I am now having problems with wirelessly connecting to the router with the usual connection settings. Most of the time it shows a list of all network connections available but when I try to connect to the usual network it shows a message saying it was unable to connect. Occasionally the wireless card connects after what seems to be a random period of time, which to me suggests that it might be to do with the signal but the router is not even a metre away from me and it shows full signal strength in Win 7,


    I’m fairly certain that there is no problem with the router because I can connect wirelessly without any problems with my PS3. I can also connect to the router directly with an Ethernet cable to my laptop without any problems at all.

    I’ve tried doing the following to resolve the issue:
    - Disable/enable the wireless card

    - Reinstall the latest driver for the network card

    - Resetting the router back to its defaults

    - Turn off power saving features, or tried setting to max performance

    - Removing anti-virus and firewall software

    - Tried running Win7 in safe mode with newtworking options


    All without any success. I’ve also tried ringing Acer support but they suggested I restore the laptop to its manufactured settings but I’m reluctant to do that at the moment as I don’t see how that will really resolve the problem.

    This is an intermittent problem so it’s a bit tricky to diagnose. I’m probably missing something obvious but I cannot for the life of me figure out what!
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 6,305
    Windows 7 Ultimate x64
       #2

    Hi Nonexist, welcome to the forums :)


    You may want to try Wireless Network - Remove then re-connecting to the router. This forces Windows to treat it like a brand new connection and sets all the defaults just like when you first connected and had it running fine.


    OS
      My Computer


  3. Posts : 4
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
    Thread Starter
       #3

    Hi Orbital, and thanks for the welcome.

    I followed the link and re-connected after removing the connection but still had the same problem. I then reset my laptop and it connected first time so it looks like removing and reconnecting did the trick. I'll keep an eye on it to see if it drops out again or won't re-connect.

    Thanks your help
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 6,305
    Windows 7 Ultimate x64
       #4

    That's good to hear :)

    Keep us posted and please, enjoy the forums :)
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 4
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
    Thread Starter
       #5

    Unfortunately the same problem has reared its head again

    I connected wirelessly without any problems earlier this evening, but I left my laptop for about 30 mins, screensaver came on, came back and the connection had dropped.

    The 'Not connected - Connections are available' message was displayed but I was unable to connect to my router. The signal is showing full strength, but occasionally drops to one or two bars, despite the router being in the same room. This seems a bit strange to me? I was still able to connect wirelessly without any problems with my PS3 so, again, I'm pretty sure the issue here isn't with the router.

    I've removed my wireless profile in the Manage Wireless Networks area and tried to reconnect but no luck. I've also tried rebooting, and disabling the wireless adaptor but sitll no luck. I've also removed ZoneAlarm from my machine just in case that was causing the grief but I've never had a problem with this firewall on other PCs I've had.

    I've managed to find a similar thread (can't believe I missed this when I first looked!) with people who appear to be having the same issue as me:

    laptop can detect but not connect to wireless networks

    It could just be coincidence that this is also happening on the Broadcom 802.11n adaptor, but it does seem a little odd.

    Does anyone have a clue what may be causing this? I'm starting to think it may be the wireless adaptor itself but the laptop is brand new! I'd like to try other options before considering sending the laptop back to the manufacturer.

    Many thanks in advance
      My Computer


  6. Posts : 4
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
    Thread Starter
       #6

    I think I've managed to sort the problem, so I thought I'd update this thread in case anyone else has a similar problem as me.

    I ended up accessing my Sky Broadband router and changed the channel from 'Auto' to '6' (as a random guess!) and it seems to be working okay now. I think this means that there may have been interference with my Broadcom Wireless card which prevented it from keeping a connection with the router? I dunno, like I said I've little to no knowledge of wireless networking but it seems to have done the trick for me.

    Fingers crossed...
      My Computer


  7. Posts : 1
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
       #7

    I know that this post is quite a long time after last post. But I've had a similar problem as NonExist. I have recently (6 weeks) bought an Acer Aspire 5742Z and am running Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit. Wireless connectivity to a Virgin Media Netgear router has been fine since the beginning until a few days' ago. For no apparent reason, I now seem to lose connectivity to the router, seen by no web access using Firefox 3.6 or Firefox 4.0 and no pop-access using Outlook 2010, and not being able to talk to router's web server. Oddly, though, most of the times, my laptop shows that the PC wireless adapter is connected to the router i.e. the wireless signal strength symbol shows a connection! Removing the wireless network connection completely (in Network and Sharing Centre - manage wireless networks) and then re-connecting often seems to re-start the connectivity.

    Anyone got any ideas how I can trouble shoot this problem further?
      My Computer


 

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