[Mac Man]

I'm a recent Mac OS convert, but have been lurking here for a while. So please forgive the first post status of this message!

I currently own a MacBook Pro and an Intel Mini -- both of which were just updated to Mac OS 10.4.6.

With 10.4.5 I had no trouble at all connecting via 802.11g to my Netgear wireless router. Ever since the update to 10.4.6, booting has become an issue. Upon boot, the MacBook appears to connect to my access point. (Full signal strength is indicated and there's a checkmark next to my network's name in the Airport status menu) However, it's refusing to DHCP a network address on boot.

Instead of DHCP-ing it is self-assigning a private 169.254.*.* address. The only solution at this point is to turn off the Airport interface and turn it back on. If that's done, it connects correctly and uses DHCP to obtain an address.

I've tried deleting all of the preferred network profiles and recreating the one for my network in addition to deleting all of the network keys from the keyring and recreating them. Neither has affected the problem.

Two questions:

1) Has anyone else experienced this behavior following the 10.4.6 update?

2) Does anyone have any suggestions on things to try to work around the glitch?

Thanks in advance for any help people can offer!

drp

[The_Man]

I am having the same issue (and only since the 10.4.6 update) and the only way I can fix is to re-enter the AP name and WPA key after every boot. Very annoying. I would love to hear if anyone has a fix for this. For me it seems to only happen on APs using a WPA key. I have an open AP at home and the MBP always gets a proper IT address there, but not at work with WPA keyed APs. Help anyone?

[Gary Finley]

Sorry I can't offer help here, but you're not alone in this. I have exactly the same problem. MacBook Pro, 10.4.6, NetGear hub using WPA. It's always a fiddle to get an address from the Netgear's DHCP server. I've tried all sorts of combinations of procedure. Turning the MacBook's Airport off & on again sometimes helps, but not reliably. I updated the Netgear firmware to the latest version, no help. Yesterday I tried setting up the Netgear for fixed address assignment (same IP to a given MAC address each time), but that didn' t help either. In my case, it seems to always work immediately after a Netgear reboot.

My previous portable was a G4 iBook, which worked every time with the the same Netgear hub using WPA, and I mean *every* time. It never gave me any DHCP trouble at all.

I've had no luck trying to use WEP instead. The MacBook won't work with Netgear WEP and the old iBook wouldn't either. Both machines work fine with WEP on the Linksys hub we have at work.

[villalobos]

Originally Posted by drp

I'm a recent Mac OS convert, but have been lurking here for a while. So please forgive the first post status of this message!

I currently own a MacBook Pro and an Intel Mini -- both of which were just updated to Mac OS 10.4.6.

With 10.4.5 I had no trouble at all connecting via 802.11g to my Netgear wireless router. Ever since the update to 10.4.6, booting has become an issue. Upon boot, the MacBook appears to connect to my access point. (Full signal strength is indicated and there's a checkmark next to my network's name in the Airport status menu) However, it's refusing to DHCP a network address on boot.

Instead of DHCP-ing it is self-assigning a private 169.254.*.* address. The only solution at this point is to turn off the Airport interface and turn it back on. If that's done, it connects correctly and uses DHCP to obtain an address.

I've tried deleting all of the preferred network profiles and recreating the one for my network in addition to deleting all of the network keys from the keyring and recreating them. Neither has affected the problem.

Two questions:

1) Has anyone else experienced this behavior following the 10.4.6 update?

2) Does anyone have any suggestions on things to try to work around the glitch?

Thanks in advance for any help people can offer!

drp

Do you have a MacBook Pro? I am having the same issue. In general, logging on a neighbor open wifi then on my netowrk works. And as you said, just shutting off airport and back on again, although is does not always work. let's hope for a fix in 10.4.7. Welcome to the quirks of OSX

[TypeMRT]

Same problem has been bugging me since day 1 with the MBP. Apple tech support says to move the network to the top of the Preferred list but the problem remains. My AlBook had ZERO problem set to Auto and finding this new (4 months old) Netgear and 2 other routers.
Sigh...