Friday, April 20, 2007

macbook pro airport seems to need SSID broadcast

After spending an hour of troubleshooting, I found that my new MacBook Pro 2.33Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo needs SSID broadcast enabled for it to connect to my NetGear WGT624. I have not confirmed that with the Apple documentation yet, but an hour of troubleshooting and experimentation shows that the MacBook will not connect to my wireless router without the router broadcasting the SSID.

Speaking of which, here is a short list of things with which to verify your wireless connection. Hope they are helpful:

On the Router:
1) make sure SSID Broadcast is enabled :)
2) verify the wireless mode (g&b, g only, b only, 108Mbps only, Auto 108Mbps)
3) verify what security you are using (none, WEP or WiFi Protected Access Pre-Shared Key (WPA-PSK))
4) verify any advanced 108Mbps or extended range features are enabled or disabled

On the attaching computer:
1) verify that the wireless network name you are connecting to is the same as your router is broadcasting
2) verify that the type of wireless security (none, WEP, WPA, LEAP, 802.1X WEP) matches what is being used by your wireless router
3) verify that your WPA passphrase or WEP key is correctly entered as Hex or ASCII
- Hex will allow a longer, more difficult to remember password
- ASCII will give you the english language translation of the Hex password, usually shorter
4) for WEP, verify the Authentication Type (auto, open system, shared key) and the encryption strength

good luck!

2 comments:

Amarand said...

I have a new Macbook and am experiencing the same problem with the latest update (10.5.3) and not broadcasting SSID. After a call to Apple and an escalation, I received the "wait for Knowledgebase article or Update to be released." They said it could take a week to a month or more, but with the date of this article being over a year ago, I'm not holding my breath. Any news of your problem being resolved? I dislike broadcasting my SSID, but if that's what it takes for now...I'll do it. It's just a shame that in 10.5.2 and 10.5.1, the hidden SSID worked fine.

Cacasodo said...

Sorry Amarand,
No progress on this one.
'sodo

Feel free to drop me a line or ask me a question.