Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[peterhaas]

> For the OP perhaps a 'repeater' would solve your problem?

Alas, many of the Broadcom (and perhaps other) WiFi sticks are power-hungry.

Some, in my experience many Broadcom Mini-PCI-e sticks, will degrade over
time, thereby necessitating a replacement.

The first indication of the impending demise is failure to exchange the
WPA keys with the access point, although the control panel may, indeed,
"see" the network.

At least for a while. And, thereafter, it may, indeed, fail to see your
network (although it may, indeed, see others' networks).

Forewarned is forearmed.



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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Tina K.]

On 2011/04/13 19:22, Clark Martin so eloquently wrote:

There was one or more versions of the PowerBook that had problems
with WiFi range.  It was basically a design error (AFAIK).  Your
model is from around that period but I don't know specifics.  This
means that you may never get acceptable reception.


My Al book has worse reception than my G4 iBooks did, and all of my 
Macs, desktop and notebook, see fewer networks than my friends do with 
their Windoze boxes.


For the OP perhaps a 'repeater' would solve your problem?

Tina

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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Bruce - in Orlando]

Well, I tried installing Tiger (10.4.11) last night and it did not
work.  Therefore I assume it's an antenna problem.  Therefore I will
move along to Plan B, the USB wifi dongle.  The good news is I now
seem to have two perfectly good Airport Extreme cards to sell on the
Swaplist.  Maybe I should also throw in my extra original Airport card
from the Pismo.

Bruce - in Orlando

On Apr 14, 3:12 pm, Kris Tilford  wrote:
> On Apr 14, 2011, at 8:47 AM, Bruce Johnson wrote:
>
> > You're seriously suggesting that Apple would ship laptops with a 5'  
> > wifi range?
>
> Apple shipped not one iPhone, but TWO iPhone's with a major antenna/
> reception issue. If you Google search this issue you can find MANY  
> people having this problem with aluminum PowerBooks. I can attest that  
> I have worked on a 15" 1.67GHz aluminum PowerBook that had this  
> problem, but as Alex suggested, when I downgraded back to Tiger (at  
> the owner's request because Leopard was "too slow"), the reception  
> issue cleared up. I can say for certain it wasn't an antenna issue,  
> but it may be a Leopard software bug issue?
>
> I still think the best solution may be a USB external dongle like this  
> one which is $16 shipped:
>
>   >
>
> NOTE: This one uses the Zydas chipset which is OS X compatible, but it  
> might be better to find something with a Broadcom chipset. Also, Apple  
> has used both Broadcom and Atheros chipsets in their Airport cards.  
> The Atheros are considered to be inferior in terms of range, so if  
> this PowerBook has an Atheros chipset Airport card it might be worth  
> switching to a Broadcom chipset card.

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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Kris Tilford]

On Apr 14, 2011, at 8:47 AM, Bruce Johnson wrote:

You're seriously suggesting that Apple would ship laptops with a 5'  
wifi range?


Apple shipped not one iPhone, but TWO iPhone's with a major antenna/ 
reception issue. If you Google search this issue you can find MANY  
people having this problem with aluminum PowerBooks. I can attest that  
I have worked on a 15" 1.67GHz aluminum PowerBook that had this  
problem, but as Alex suggested, when I downgraded back to Tiger (at  
the owner's request because Leopard was "too slow"), the reception  
issue cleared up. I can say for certain it wasn't an antenna issue,  
but it may be a Leopard software bug issue?


I still think the best solution may be a USB external dongle like this  
one which is $16 shipped:





NOTE: This one uses the Zydas chipset which is OS X compatible, but it  
might be better to find something with a Broadcom chipset. Also, Apple  
has used both Broadcom and Atheros chipsets in their Airport cards.  
The Atheros are considered to be inferior in terms of range, so if  
this PowerBook has an Atheros chipset Airport card it might be worth  
switching to a Broadcom chipset card.


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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Bruce - in Orlando]

Really? - That would be a really easy fix then, at least to try before
moving on to Plan B which I think would be Kris's USB 802.11n WIFI
adapter.  I installed Tiger on my MDD and my previous powerbook
(Pismo), but when this one came with Leopard I figured I'd just leave
it there and see how I like it.  So far, I'm not feeling the love
anyway.  I haven't loaded too much stuff on this AlBook yet, so should
I just figure on wiping it all out and starting over?

On Apr 14, 11:22 am, Alex Barnes  wrote:
> This seems to be a Leopard bug. That has happened to me several times,
> all on Macs running Leopard. A simple downgrade or upgrade fixed the
> problem.
>
>
>
> >> On Apr 13, 2011, at 3:03 PM, Bruce - in Orlando wrote:
>
> >>> Can anyone tell me what the real problem is?
>
> >> It appears the aluminum PowerBook suffers like the Ti PowerBook did, bad 
> >> reception because of metal case (Faraday cage
>
> > Well, for one, no they don't. I've owned both, and while the TiBook indeed 
> > has poorer wifi range the AlBook is just fine. (tested on both with a USB 
> > wifi dongle.) Crucially NEITHER has range as poor as the OP describes.
>
> > His issue is a broken, unattached, or dislodged antenna.
>
> > You're seriously suggesting that Apple would ship laptops with a 5' wifi 
> > range?!- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Alex Barnes]

This seems to be a Leopard bug. That has happened to me several times,
all on Macs running Leopard. A simple downgrade or upgrade fixed the
problem.


>> On Apr 13, 2011, at 3:03 PM, Bruce - in Orlando wrote:
>>
>>> Can anyone tell me what the real problem is?
>>
>> It appears the aluminum PowerBook suffers like the Ti PowerBook did, bad 
>> reception because of metal case (Faraday cage
>
> Well, for one, no they don't. I've owned both, and while the TiBook indeed 
> has poorer wifi range the AlBook is just fine. (tested on both with a USB 
> wifi dongle.) Crucially NEITHER has range as poor as the OP describes.
>
> His issue is a broken, unattached, or dislodged antenna.
>
> You're seriously suggesting that Apple would ship laptops with a 5' wifi 
> range?!

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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Bruce Johnson]

On Apr 13, 2011, at 7:30 PM, Kris Tilford  wrote:

> On Apr 13, 2011, at 3:03 PM, Bruce - in Orlando wrote:
> 
>> Can anyone tell me what the real problem is?
> 
> It appears the aluminum PowerBook suffers like the Ti PowerBook did, bad 
> reception because of metal case (Faraday cage

Well, for one, no they don't. I've owned both, and while the TiBook indeed has 
poorer wifi range the AlBook is just fine. (tested on both with a USB wifi 
dongle.) Crucially NEITHER has range as poor as the OP describes.

His issue is a broken, unattached, or dislodged antenna.

You're seriously suggesting that Apple would ship laptops with a 5' wifi range?

-- 
Bruce Johnson


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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Kris Tilford]

On Apr 13, 2011, at 3:03 PM, Bruce - in Orlando wrote:


Can anyone tell me what the real problem is?


It appears the aluminum PowerBook suffers like the Ti PowerBook did,  
bad reception because of metal case (Faraday cage). A few people  
bought external antennas from QuickerTek, but they don't seem to make  
these any more, and they were very expensive. You can build a homemade  
Pringle's can external antenna but this will make your PowerBook look  
like some sort of weapon and you'll probably get arrested if you use  
it in public, see:



A USB 802.11n WIFI adapter might be the optimal choice. Get any model  
using a Broadcom chipset and it will be recognized as Apple Airport as  
long as the correct VID & PID are listed in the info.plist of the  
Broadcom plugin (AppleAirPortBrcm4311.kext) of the IO80211Family.kext.  
There's a script available to add all known combinations of VID & PID  
so that everything works, it's called "bcm43xx_enabler.sh". A cheap  
USB 802.11n adapter would be both an upgrade and hopefully fix the  
reception issue, and as long as it's Broadcom chipset it will  
integrate perfectly as if it was regular Apple Airport (remove your  
OEM Airport card first, and delete "Airport" from System  
Preferences>Network prior to adding the USB adapter. Then reboot with  
the USB adapter, go to Network and it should auto-detect the "new"  
Airport hardware and you should be in business.


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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Clark Martin]

On Apr 13, 2011, at 1:03 PM, Bruce - in Orlando wrote:

> I recently purchased a 12" 1.5 Ghz Powerbook on eBay (running OS
> 10.5.x).  The auction description said "the Airport Extreme card
> doesn't seem to be working correctly."  Once I received the laptop, I
> figured out that the problem is really that this powerbook has a very
> short wireless reception distance - such that when I first powered it
> on, sitting at my computer desk about 5 feet from the wireless router
> (linksys) it worked just fine.  But when I sat with the laptop on the
> other side of the same room, about 15 feet from the router, reception
> was only fair.  Take the laptop to the next room, about 25 feet from
> the router, and you're totally out of luck.
> 
> So at first I thought the problem must be with the Airport card, so I
> bought another one - they aren't very expensive.  Now I find that the
> reception problem has not changed at all, so the card can't be the
> problem.
> 
> Can anyone tell me what the real problem is?  I'm just hoping it's not
> on the motherboard, because they really are expensive.


There was one or more versions of the PowerBook that had problems with WiFi 
range.  It was basically a design error (AFAIK).  Your model is from around 
that period but I don't know specifics.  This means that you may never get 
acceptable reception.  

Make sure your router is using 802.11g, it tends to do better than 802.11b.

You could try a web search to dig up info from back when.

Clark Martin
Redwood City, CA, USA
Macintosh / Internet Consulting

"I'm a designated driver on the Information Super Highway"

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Re: Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Bruce Johnson]

On Apr 13, 2011, at 1:03 PM, Bruce - in Orlando wrote:

> 
> So at first I thought the problem must be with the Airport card, so I
> bought another one - they aren't very expensive.  Now I find that the
> reception problem has not changed at all, so the card can't be the
> problem.
> 
> Can anyone tell me what the real problem is?  I'm just hoping it's not
> on the motherboard, because they really are expensive.


Well it'll be a pain to fix, but if it's not the airport card, it's the 
antenna, which has probably somehow come loose and is not longer functioning 
well.

The antenna, iirc, is built into the upper display.


-- 
Bruce Johnson
University of Arizona
College of Pharmacy
Information Technology Group

Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs


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Poor wireless reception on G4 Aluminum Powerbook

[Bruce - in Orlando]

I recently purchased a 12" 1.5 Ghz Powerbook on eBay (running OS
10.5.x).  The auction description said "the Airport Extreme card
doesn't seem to be working correctly."  Once I received the laptop, I
figured out that the problem is really that this powerbook has a very
short wireless reception distance - such that when I first powered it
on, sitting at my computer desk about 5 feet from the wireless router
(linksys) it worked just fine.  But when I sat with the laptop on the
other side of the same room, about 15 feet from the router, reception
was only fair.  Take the laptop to the next room, about 25 feet from
the router, and you're totally out of luck.

So at first I thought the problem must be with the Airport card, so I
bought another one - they aren't very expensive.  Now I find that the
reception problem has not changed at all, so the card can't be the
problem.

Can anyone tell me what the real problem is?  I'm just hoping it's not
on the motherboard, because they really are expensive.

Bruce - in Orlando

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