Troubleshooting
I’d had a long, tiring day yesterday, and wanted nothing more to get home and relax. I woke my laptop at home to check my email quickly, and found that it hadn’t connected to the wireless network. When I tried to connect (it listed our network as available), it gave a rather cryptic error. Odd. So I went into diagnostic mode: the iMac was connected to the same network wirelessly with no problems, so it didn’t seem to be a problem with the router. I double-checked passwords and settings, and they seemed fine. I connected directly to the router via ethernet, and that let me connect. Finally, I tried my old trick of logging in as a newly-created user, which helps to isolate the problem if it’s an error with a preference file in your own user folder. Still no filled Airport signal strength segments, which would have indicated that my laptop had rejoined the wireless party.
At this point, I was gloomily thinking that my wireless card must be broken, and I’d have to get it fixed, and also that I was blowing most of the evening getting frustrated with a technical problem, neither of which were good things. I decided to have one last go. The Network pane of System Preferences has a button at the bottom labelled ‘Assist me…’, so I thought I’d give it a try. You then get a further dialogue with two choices: ‘Diagnostics’ or ‘Assistant’. I tried Diagnostics first, and got taken through the steps to check the Airport card, including turning the router off and on again (which would have been greatly improved by an audio clip of Roy from IT Crowd saying “Have you tried turning it off and on again?” in an Irish accent). At the end of the process, it shrugged its shoulders and said it couldn’t fix the problem and didn’t know what the problem was. Sorry. Thanks very much Diagnostics.
As a last resort, I tried ‘Assistant’. It politely walked me through the steps to set up a new connection, which I didn’t expect to work. But lo and behold! At the end of the process, I was connected again.
I’m not sure what the moral of this rambling story is, but if you find yourself with weird network problems, try Assistant before resorting to Diagnostics (aka Roy), and you might have more of your evening to enjoy. I still don’t know what the original problem was, but I suspect that my laptop was sulking because, being UK-based, it didn’t have a new iPhone friend to talk to on Friday night.
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But we should trust our life and liberty to computers........... shouldn't we?
Bearing in mind that the iPhone is about as much use as a chocolate teapot, perhaps it was reminding you of the fallibility of computers in general, and the Apple in particular; a gentle hint not to spend £400 or £500 on the iPhone when it arrives in the UK.
by Jonathan Briggs @ 30/06/2007 12:29 pm • Permalink •
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None of these sulks! You have to show your laptop who is boss, with some appropriate show of not sparing the rod and spoiling the computer. I know it will hurt you more than it hurts the laptop, but it has to be done. (Says he, who discovered he couldn't live without his laptop when it failed...)
by Tony Price @ 30/06/2007 2:56 pm • Permalink •
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Hard to say what was a problem. Try to show it to specialists in this... or throw it out and buy another one
by Ken @ 30/06/2007 6:42 pm • Permalink •
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That's right tony, you have to tackle it in the living room and bite its ears. It's the only way you're going to show your laptop who the alpha of the house is!
by Chuck Vose @ 01/07/2007 11:25 pm • Permalink •
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Jonathan Briggs: Well, I can't let 'chocolate teapot' pass without comment. According to all the reports, it does what it's supposed to do very well, so it's very functional. Whether you think that functionality is worth the money is another question, and one that I haven't decided on myself. The pricing for the UK hasn't been fixed yet, but I would be hoping for a lot less than £s;500-£s;600, since that's what it is in dollars. My car has given me a heck of a lot more trouble than any of my computers ever have.
Tony, Ken and Chuck: Well, it seems fine now. I was just having a bit of a rant about it because of the wasted time, but I think it was just one of those things. I'm certainly not throwing it out!
by bsag @ 02/07/2007 7:13 pm • Permalink •
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I get a problem that sounds a lot like this on my windows vista laptop. If I am connecting to a network whilst I have a program like lime wire or bit torrent open it wont work. Try closing all internet programs before connecting or it wont work. Also some times it helps to turn of the wireless device in the laptop. On mine I have a hot keep and then I press a wireless sign and it turns off. Leave it for about 10 seconds and pop it back on. Of course any wireless networks would have disappeared but then reappeared when you turned it back on. Even the ones you have saved! That along side sometimes it helps to restart your laptop if all of these fail. Come to think of it there’s millions of problems and it could be either one of them. But don’t take my word for it! I am 16 and not qualified to talk about these things. I am just feeding you some of my research. I taught my self all I know bout computers. Roll on collage when I get my degree!
Ian. www.IanMacNb.net
by Ian @ 04/07/2007 10:16 am • Permalink •
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Thats technology for you. At work the same wire less router would fail every friday for 8 weeks until my tight arse boss finally replaced it. Go figure.
by John @ 09/02/2008 2:45 am • Permalink •
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