Lousy Airport reception with iMac G5

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Sander Tekelenburg - 29 May 2005 02:43 GMT

An iMac G5 won't connect to a Linksys WRT54G, even at half a meter away,
unless the iMac's option "Use Interference Robustness" (under the
Airport menu) is enabled. But with that opton on, and the Linksys at its
planned 10 meters distance, the reception gets bad - the Airport menu
indiocates reception quality as constantly moving between 1 to 3
'stripes'. WLAN speed doesn't get above some 500KB/s.

A PB G4 1.33Ghz on the same WLAN doesn't need the "Use Interference
Robustness" option to be enabled. No reception problems.

Why would the iMac need "Use Interference Robustness" on?

What exactly *is* "Use Interference Robustness"?

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Sander Tekelenburg, <http://www.euronet.nl/~tekelenb/>

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Bob Harris - 29 May 2005 05:08 GMT

> An iMac G5 won't connect to a Linksys WRT54G, even at half a meter away,
> unless the iMac's option "Use Interference Robustness" (under the
[quoted text clipped - 9 lines]
>
> What exactly *is* "Use Interference Robustness"?

sounds like an antenna problem. I would check to make sure the antenna
wire is properly attached to the Airport Extreme card. (Does the iMac
G5 actually have a separate Airport Extreme card???)

Bob Harris

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Jeff Wiseman - 29 May 2005 17:14 GMT

>>An iMac G5 won't connect to a Linksys WRT54G, even at half a meter away,
>>unless the iMac's option "Use Interference Robustness" (under the
[quoted text clipped - 13 lines]
> wire is properly attached to the Airport Extreme card. (Does the iMac
> G5 actually have a separate Airport Extreme card???)

Yes it does and it is optional on the G5 iMac. The built in
antenna in the iMac has a plug on the end of it that connects to
the bottom of the Airport extreme card. However, there is a hole
in the plastic mount that holds that airport card and if the card
isn't present (like in most new iMacs) the plug plugs into the
hole in the mount to keep it from bouncing around.

I'm looking at a picture of this and it appears that this hole is
only a mere fraction of an inch from where the socket on the
airport card is located. In other words, it seems that it might
be possible to install a new airport extreme card with the
antenna not connected but it would look like the antenna *IS*
connected unless you look real close. You should probably take
that back off of your iMac and check that the antenna is actually
plugged into the card itself and not just into antenna plug
holder for airportless iMacs (or even just hanging free).

There is a .pdf document in Apple's knowledgebase on replacing
the backup battery that shows these pics quite well (the backup
battery is located under the airport extreme card. The card has
to be removed in order to get at the backup battery).

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Jeff Wiseman
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Sander Tekelenburg - 29 May 2005 23:06 GMT

[...]

> sounds like an antenna problem. I would check to make sure the antenna
> wire is properly attached to the Airport Extreme card.

Yes, it is. I triple-checked already.

> (Does the iMac
> G5 actually have a separate Airport Extreme card???)

Yes.

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Sander Tekelenburg, <http://www.euronet.nl/~tekelenb/>

Mac user: "Macs only have 40 viruses, tops!"
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Mac Forum / General / Networking / May 2005

Lousy Airport reception with iMac G5