Apple's iOS 6 Wi-Fi problems linger on | Hacker News Reader

Apple's iOS 6 Wi-Fi problems linger on

zdnet.com

50 pointsCrankyBear24 comments

I think that by now, everyone should have learned the lesson to not buy anything the instant it comes out. It seems like every first batch of hardware has issues, and every major software revision requires bug fixes.

The very simple solution is to wait. I always wait for the first major patch to OS X before upgrading, and a couple of months before new hardware. While I don't have the latest shiny gadget, my life is a lot simpler.

I shudder whenever I see someone upgrading the development machine their professional life depends upon to the new version of OS X on release day.

I think another simple "solution" is to realize that these issues are probably way rarer than the press seems to indicate. I got my iPhone 5 on release day, and haven't had any of these problems. Same with my iPhone 4 and "antennagate." Maybe I'm just fortunate to avoid these issues, but I've seen no reason to not upgrade immediately.

Exactly. I've been running iOS 6 since the first developer seed without a problem. The media treats each bug as an independent news story, regardless of userbase impact.

You know, I thought it wasn't that common either, but then I kept running into lots of people, especially with iPhone 4s phones and WPA2 AES APs, who did have these kind of problems. Something really is off here.

> I shudder whenever I see someone upgrading the development machine their professional life depends upon to the new version of OS X on release day.

The Arch Linux demographic.

Why is this the arch linux demographic?

I have a working arch install. I don't touch it unless I have to reboot for some reason and then I read for known issues, do the upgrade and then reboot. Otherwise, no touchy.

That's because those guys are the ones that fix all the regression bugs and "features" introduced by the new version, and release their fixes so the rest of us don't have to.

Doesn't Arch use rolling release? Kind of the opposite I think.

I use Fedora these days out of laziness, but rolling releases was one of the things I really enjoyed about Gentoo. Far less upgrade induced stress.

Rolling release is favorable in that sense. I prefer dealing with a single problem every other month or so as opposed to many things breaking all at once.

Exactly. It's also much easier to rollback one change with a regression with a rolling release system than it is when that single change with a regression came packaged with hundreds of other functional changes.

Kernel regression in Gentoo? No worries, boot the old one.

Kernel regression in Fedora? No worries, boot the old one... unless this was across an upgrade boundary. Then you get to have fun.

While this may be easy to say if you're keeping abreast of the latest technology news and newest gadgets, to the general consumer it makes no sense at all. Once a product hits retail shelves (or is available as an over-the-air upgrade in the case of iOS 6) people will buy/download it and there's a general expectation that it will work as expected.

I've gotten used to never upgrading my idevices before doing a search for potential problems. I usually just stick with the last iteration of ios designed for that generation of hardware.

I have owned every iPhone model and have never one one issue with Wifi. And I work in the mobile business so I have probably been on 500+ wifi networks.

I have had a similar experience until iOS6, I am not happy.

Apple's software development seems to play a second fiddle to their hardware development a lot.

This is OK in most instances since I don't buy a lot of their software, but if you fail to get the firmware and the drivers working, it's a major problem.

Me and many others are encountering similar issues on Apple laptops since upgrading to OS X 10.8 (search for mountain lion wifi problems). Things that appear to help for me are running a ping to the router in the background, or disabling WPA 2.

Also, iOS 6/OS X 10.8 users are having trouble access points at my workplace, while other devices appear to be working fine. Since OS X 10.8, I'm also having trouble connecting it to my Samsung Galaxy S3's WiFi hotspot, whereas my girlfriend's 10.7 laptop is connecting without issue.

That said, every OS upgrade seems to have a bunch of issues that affect a small number of users, and the current ones don't seem particularly abnormal.

Android doesn't get a pass here either. I have a GSM Galaxy Nexus with the OS directly provided by Google. After the Android 4.1 update wifi is completely unreliable. I work from home so the phone is on wifi most of the time. I usually have to reboot it to get wifi working again, although sometimes turning wifi off and then on works after a minute or so. (This doesn't affect any of my other wifi devices nor this phone with the prior OS version.)

Google have known about it since mid-July https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=34942

Much as they've made other mistakes, lingering WiFi issues are not necessarily Apple's fault. There are all sorts of things that can go wrong.

For example, I've had routers be unstable with some particular devices because of specific encryption settings. Ironically, I learned about that chipset problem while I was getting ready to throw dd-wrt on the offending router in frustration. I've had access points give super-slow connections to new devices until the AP was rebooted. And on and on.

WiFi works most of the time, but when it doesn't it usually isn't easy to figure out what (or even where) the problem really is.

Does anyone else feel the iOS6 has more drawbacks than previous updates?

Like having ONE issue, the Maps, and everything else being better?

Says he in a thread about wifi problems? I'm regretting upgrading and not because of the maps. My work wifi has become completely unreliable.

I have an iPhone 4S and my Wifi is WPA2-AES secured and I haven't had any issues with Wifi in any locations that I've used it.

I have a 4S and my home WiFi with AES is nearly unusable (extremely slow and major packet loss), I have to disable WiFi and use cellular. Was working fine with iOS 5.

At work my iPad3 is doing the same thing with our AES WiFi but working fine at home.

Also WiFi tethering is not working with similar issues between the two devices but bluetooth is fine.

Again iOS5 had been working perfectly for a year on these networks. I am not happy.

I had this issue with my iPad, but not my iPhone (same wifi network) and then an hour later.... magic. It worked.

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