Question Weird Wi-Fi connection problem ?

[sacentre]

Can anyone suggest what could be causing this? In 30 years of experience building and troubleshooting PCs, I haven't seen or heard of this issue before.

Just yesterday, my wife's Windows 10 desktop AND her Android phone stopped detecting our wi-fi access point . (The Wi-Fi router is only about 8 feet away in the same room). The weird thing is that when I check available networks, both devices can "see" all my neighbours' networks in our block - just NOT ours. Her phone works normally at all the outside Wi-Fi spots we go to like cafes etc. My own two Windows 11 desktop PCs, my HP tablet as well as my Android phone all work as they should. I've made no changes to hardware or software or any config changes that might explain it. I tried rebooting the router, and changing the Wi-Fi adapter in her PC to a USB Wi-Fi dongle - same result and this still wouldn't explain why this is also happening with her Android phone.

It doesn't seem like a hardware issue so that leaves software and I'm wondering if it could be caused by a virus or malware. I can't think of anything else that might block 2 devices from seeing a single Wi-Fi network.

I'd be grateful for any suggestions.

TIA
Trevor

 

[helpstar]

unplug the router from the wall, wait for about 2minutes, replug and try again

update the router with the latest firmware

Any antivirus software or firewall installed?

are you using vpn?

Mac address filtering enabled in the router?

for testing
create a not secured wifi from the router and try connecting
disable firewall on the computer

 

[bill001g]

What can sometimes happen is the router is using channels that the end device does not support. For example channel 13 is not allowed in all areas of the world and if your router would use channel 13 and your end device was manufactured for a country that does not allow channel 13 it would not see it. Technically it does see it but it lies to you and says it can't.

This can also happen on the 5g radio band there are a bunch of radio channels that are subject to all kinds of strange avoidance rules. Like if it detect weather radar it must stop using the channel or reduce the power. A lot of end devices do not want to deal with all these rules since they vary a lot between countries and just do not support it.

Maybe try to force your router to use certain channels. Almost all countries allow channels around 40 on the 5g band.

 

[sacentre]

helpstar, bill001g, thanks for the helpful replies and suggestions. I just got home and was about to reply to your questions but thought I'd re-check the wife's PC first. I'm dammed if it didn't connect to the network normally! Ditto her Android phone. The acronym WTF? comes to mind. I have sometimes seen problems crop up and disappear on their own but the worry is, if it happens once it may happen again.

Anyway, I'll monitor the situation for now and if it re-appears, I'll have to dig a bit deeper. Thanks once again for the help.

Trevor

 

[kanewolf]

helpstar, bill001g, thanks for the helpful replies and suggestions. I just got home and was about to reply to your questions but thought I'd re-check the wife's PC first. I'm dammed if it didn't connect to the network normally! Ditto her Android phone. The acronym WTF? comes to mind. I have sometimes seen problems crop up and disappear on their own but the worry is, if it happens once it may happen again.

Anyway, I'll monitor the situation for now and if it re-appears, I'll have to dig a bit deeper. Thanks once again for the help.

Trevor

This could be exactly what @bill001g said. The router, with the channel set to "auto" chose a channel that the devices don't support. To eliminate this as a possibility, manually set the channels. 2.4Ghz should be 1, 6, or 11. 5Ghz should be a channel less than 50 for maximum compatibility.

 

[hedwar2011]

5G wifi networks are especially prone to this.

 

[sacentre]

This could be exactly what @bill001g said. The router, with the channel set to "auto" chose a channel that the devices don't support. To eliminate this as a possibility, manually set the channels. 2.4Ghz should be 1, 6, or 11. 5Ghz should be a channel less than 50 for maximum compatibility.

Thanks, I just did that - (2.4Ghz = channel 1 and 5Ghz = channel 36) although I suppose the best thing would have been to wait till the problem happened again and then change it. Still, if it does, we'll know that probably wasn't the cause. Thanks again.

EDIT

It just happened again (no surprise). I rebooted the Wi-Fi router and the wife's Android phone was able to re-connect. I'm clueless about where to go from here.

 

[sacentre]

5G wifi networks are especially prone to this.

I'll take your word for that although I've been on 5G for years and this is the first time this has happened. Thanks for the reply.

 

[sacentre]

OP here. Thanks to all for the helpful replies on this issue. It looks like the problem was caused by the router! I happened to have an unused, identical unit which I've installed using the same config file and the problem has disappeared. At least it hasn't reappeared in over 24 hours.

Obviously, I would have suspected the router itself a lot sooner if all my other devices including phone connecting to it had been affected. It beats me how it could be just the one PC and Android phone but there we are. Everything is back to normal - at least for now. Thanks again.