My wireless connection keeps dropping when the signal reads 4 bars, any suggestions?
I'm 30 feet from the connection to my main computer, but the laptop keeps going in and out - drives me insane! I live in an open concept home, no walls between the signal and me, but there is a large support beam. Since I'm in the kitchen, I can vouch that the only appliance running is the fridge. My cell phone is plugged in across the kitchen further away, and not between the laptop and the router.
It's frustrating enough that I'm starting to rarely use my laptop and yet I had no problem with the signal for the first 3 months of use. The only change was we installed a network encryption for protection - I turned it off when the problems arose, and still the problem persists.
I'm using a Dell, purchased 12/05, with a celeron processor, system is powered by windows XP and it is a factory installed wireless, no access to it. That is the extent of my computer knowledge ; ) Any ideas? Or just too damn bad?
You said the signal worked fine for the first three months so I'll assume it's not a hardware problem, at least not with your computers. It's also not an interference problem, at least not from anything you are running. If there is another wireless network in the area, that might be interfering with yours, it's possible, I had it happen once. Try changing the channel it is operating on, that will be in your router configuration, see if that helps. If none of that works then more than likely it is your router, go to the nearest store and pick up a different branded router, see if your problem goes away but it's not final. If another router fixes the problem than you can conclude with ~95% accuracy that the problem was the router. If a new router doesn't help then you might have to look into the hardware that is installed in your laptop as the problem.
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