Slashdot Mirror
Wi-Fi Issues Continue For OS X Users Despite Updates
itwbennett writes: Although Apple has never officially acknowledged issues surrounding Yosemite and Wi-Fi connectivity, the company is clearly aware of the problem: Leading off the improvements offered in the update 10.10.2 update released Tuesday was 'resolves an issue that might cause Wi-Fi to disconnect,' according to the release notes. Despite this, Apple's support forum was filled with tales of frustrated users. And Mac owners aren't the only Apple users experiencing wireless connection failures after updating their OS. Wi-Fi connectivity issues have also dogged iOS 8 since Apple released the mobile OS on Sept. 17.
Haven't had any issues here on iOS 8 or Yosemite.
I've worked with the Broadcom driver source code; it's crap. It doesn't surprise me they're having problems. What's funny is (now that I think about it and remember this from a prior job) Apple is easily Broadcom's biggest wifi customer; you'd think they could do a better job with their software for them, but apparently not.
This issue: Bonjour over AWDL is still happening on 10.10.2. Wifi download speeds immediately plummet when any service that relies on bonjour activates. You can reproduce this issue by starting a speed test of your choice and clicking anything that requires bonjour. The speed will fall like a rock.
Issuing a:
sudo ifconfig awdl0 down
will immediately restore the connection speed. It's so certain that I've been able to basically play ping pong with the DL speeds by clicking the AirPlay icon to cause it to dive and then dropping the awdl0 connection to bounce it back up. There's also a lingering disconnect problem that seems to infect Apple devices trying to connect or remain connected to WPA 2 (AES) networks although I've not seen this behavior since 10.10.2 arrived, although my testing has been limited.
I found resetting the NVRAM fixing the problem. The process: 1) Shut down your Mac. 2) Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command, Option, P, and R. 3) Turn on your Mac. 4) Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys immediately after you hear the startup sound. 5) Hold these keys until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for a second time. 6) Release the keys.