Windows clients wireless problem

[GoldenWonder]

We've got a load of netbooks running XP Pro SP3, connecting to a Ruckus wireless network and using WPA2/AES authenticating to a Radius server.

 

These seem to work well, but every so often a good percentage of them will simply fail to connect (i.e not available), even though they are in a very strong signal area. The only way to get them to reconnect to the wireless is to actually connect them to the LAN and then refresh the wireless connection. Reboot and then they work OK.

 

This has happened on several different types of netbook so I guess the problem lies with the wireless, the RADIUS server or possibly even Windows itself.

 

Anyone else had these sort of problems? When these are working its great, 20 in one room all working away with decent response times and stable connection. I've updated/downgraded the wireless card drivers but it makes no difference.

[Dom_]

What wireless cards are in the netbooks?

[GoldenWonder]

Most of them are Atheros although I think some others are earlier Broadcom ones

[skell]

Have you tried assigning them each a static IP address?

[GoldenWonder]

We've tried this in the past, and it doesn't seem to have made much difference

[GoldenWonder]

Done a bit of checking here. And when one fails it still has its wireless settings (from a GPO), its connecting to the Radius server (when i log in locally I see the radius log show errors as the local user accounts cannot be validated). But it simply sits and refuses to connect or get and IP address to allow a network login.

 

The only thing that seems to resolve the problem is to plug a lan cable in, run a gpupdate. Reboot and login again via the lan and make sure the wlan connects. From then on it will work until it randomly fails again!

 

It is pretty random as well. Different netbooks, different locations and following no pattern!

[Richie1972]

We have this problem too - not sure what causes it (possibly something like a cache or cert timing out).

Same "workaround" fixes it - until next time it happens

[grahamd22]

We currently run our Radius Server on our WSUS, should there be any reason why we shouldn't as we have a speed issue when multiple students logon onto our domain via the wireless as it will take ages to login. We use Linksys WAP4400N AP's and although some laptops are supposed to connect with draft-N they don't, the cards are Intel® WiFi Link 5100 AGN.

[trolley01]

Got exactly the same problem here with 60 Asus Eee PC.

 

Sometimes will connect on boot and other times not. Even with the wireless cards enabled and turned on, will just sit there and try to get an IP address.

 

Interestingly, we have 30 Stone NT300 laptops, and 30 Acer Aspire laptops that work perfectly each and every time.

 

Not sure of the types of wireless cards that are in all of these devices. Could find out, and post back if it would help!

 

Would be good to get this sorted though so that we could reliably use everything that we have bought.

[trolley01]

We currently run our Radius Server on our WSUS, should there be any reason why we shouldn't as we have a speed issue when multiple students logon onto our domain via the wireless as it will take ages to login. We use Linksys WAP4400N AP's and although some laptops are supposed to connect with draft-N they don't, the cards are Intel® WiFi Link 5100 AGN.

 

Really depends on your wireless setup. A single AP is not going to cope well with an entire class logging on, downloading a profile, etc. I assume you have a good coverage of AP's. Wouldn't have thought that running Radius on the same server as WSUS would have caused a problem.

 

Here we try to make sure that every room is covered by 2 AP's. (On different channels of course). Not perfect, but helps a lot.

 

No idea on the draft-N connectivity though - we haven't gone that advanced yet!

[accura2000]

How long has this been going on? ~I have had a similar problem but with our Netgear WFS709TP setup. Its worked flawlessly for nearly 2 years then all of a sudden, our older ~Acer Extensa notebooks with Atheros wireless cards fail to get an ipaddress, it just reports "Invalid IP Address" although connected to the wireless network with excellent signal strength.

 

The only common factors between our networks is that the wireless cards are Atheros and the clients are running XP Pro SP3. Strangely the Acer Aspire 3410, with Atheros cards work fine but are running Windows 7 Pro.

 

Any ideas?

 

Update: Juist put a fresh install of Win7 on one of the Extensa laptops and its working perfectly on my wireless network! Put and fresh XP install on it and it plays around....

Edited November 5, 2010 by accura2000