# Problems connecting Leopard to Wireless network



## hhk (May 31, 2006)

Anyone else having problems connecting to a 802.11g wireless router after their upgrade? Mine simply won't connect. When I go to network settings to manually configure my Airport connection, I get the message "incompatible security" after I input my password. This is using WEP (I know a drunk monkey can hack it but I have reasons for running WEP).

I did a search on Apple discussion forums and there are many reports of this problem. I see no definitive solution. 

I'm hoping someone here might know of a fix.

BTW, I have two other Macs, one running Panther and another running Tiger and neither have trouble connecting.


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

I have problems too, although not exactly the same. Here is what I posted in another thread:

Unusual Leopard Cursor/Airport Issue
Brand new MBP 2.2 Ghz with 4 G RAM

When put to sleep by closing lid and awakened an hour or so later, Leopard often does not see my Airport Extreme signal. When I click on the Airport icon in the menu, the drop down menu shows no networks and the cursor behaves crazy. I cannot use it to close the drop down menu. The cursor flits from side to side and up and down on the screen, going anywhere but where I want it. Then a dialogue window pops up saying none of your trusted networks can be found and lists the very trusted network I want, along with those of two neighbours.

I cannot use the cursor to either select the network or to close the window. I continues to bounce happily around on its own.

My only recourse is to force quit by holding down the power button. On restart, all is fine again and it sees and connects to my network and it will wake from sleep after closing the lid with no issues for most of the day.

But the next time I open the lid and see no Airport signal in seconds, I know the cursor will go crazy once again.

I have tried to repair permissions but we all know that is a lost cause in Leopard, that takes seven to eight minutes and accomplishes nothing.


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## Howard2k (Feb 9, 2005)

Are you entering the key in hex or ASCII? Don't you have to put a $ sign at the start for hex? Or is that ASCII? Or am I totally wrong?


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## hhk (May 31, 2006)

Today I woke up, fired up the laptop and tried to connect to my network. I entered in my password (no $ sign) and it connected and worked flawlessly. 

So I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing right today when I realized that I was in the part of the house closest to my main router, a Linksys. Previously, I was trying to connect to an Airport Express set up as a WDS relay.

So the problem was with the Airport Express. I did a hard reset on it, re-configured it and all my problems disappeared. 

I have no idea what happened but the fact that my Panther and Tiger machines had no trouble leads me to believe that there are some Airport issues with Leopard.


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## Jezbee (Feb 29, 2008)

*This seems to work*

Hi,

I've been experiencing problems with a Mac Leopard OS System, which had previously connected to My Wireless router via a WEP Key no problems, but then started giving me the incompatible security problem. My other Tiger Mac worked fine.

My more savvy brother came and solved it, heres how. It appears Leopard doesn't like WEP security, so you need to:

- Hard wire your router to the Mac ethernet port
- type the Routers IP address into your browser (usually ending in 1.1, check the manual)
- change the security type to WPA (we changed it to WPA2-PSK, seemed to work)
- Save the changes, reboot computer/router, disconnect hardwire.

This will mean you'll have to re-connect your other PCs running to the router, but seeing as you've just made the new password, it shouldn't be too hard to remember.

Happy surfings.


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## CubaMark (Feb 16, 2001)

FWIW, I've seen what might be odd behaviour since installing Leopard. The café here in Zacatecas where I usually connect occasionally "disappears" from my menu, and I go offline, necessitating a manual re-connect. But - that could be their router, as I have no way of checking their setup (no idea what kind of router they have).

And here at home... my Airport Express (the little white cube, first version) has randomly disconnected three or four times in the past week. Unplugging, letting it sit, and re-connecting returns it to service. But... is that Leopard's fault, or circumstance? Maybe my AE is failing when it gets too warm?

Also - regarding security - at the Café, they use a 128-bit WEP. At home, I have WPA Personal set up, with MAC address filtering.

M


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

I've had no issues related to wireless connectivity and Leopard upgrades. I'm running 10.5.2 wireless with a Hawking router (which I don't recommend -- they're reliable, but their interface is crap and they use different terms for EVERYTHING we've come to think of a standard about router terminology).

I am soooo sorry I sold my Airport router. I despise these web interfaces and will probably stick with Apple from here on out.


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

So naturally, the minute I finish writing the above post, my internet service goes down. 

It was in fact an outage from Shaw's end ... everything was back to normal about 10 minutes later. Doh!


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## absolutetotalgeek (Sep 18, 2005)

There is some kind of issue with Leopard and wireless connectivity that's for sure. At the Williams I go to where their wireless is free, which is cool, no one with a Mac running leopard can connect, I took my other MB which is running Tiger and there is no problem at all. Funny thing is I can go 50 feet and connect to the place down street on their 'open' router so I don't know what the problem is but there is something going on. 

I asked the owner and he said they've changed nothing as far as their service or routers go. I've been going there for years and it's always been fine pre-Leopard.

Weird.....


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