After months of waiting, I finally bought a brand spankin’ new MacBook this weekend — a replacement for my beloved (but aging … and PowerPC-based) 12″ PowerBook G4.
Disappointment set in quickly, though, when I got the MacBook home, cranked it up, and discovered that its ability to access the Internet was severely hampered. Our two Windows PCs and my trusty PowerBook were both working normally with our Apple AirPort base station, registering download speeds of 6451 kbps and upload speeds of 3439 kbps at SpeedTest.net.
My brand new MacBook, though, was draggin’ — pulling down just 100 kbps and sending up just 55 kbps. Speedwise, that’s just a little faster than a 56k telephone-based modem.
And that sucks, kiddies, because Uncle Mark likes him some email, iChat, iTunes, and YouTube … all of which became unusable due to the MacBook’s inability to utilize an internet connection properly.
After some Googling around, I discovered this issue is widely documented on Leopard-based MacBooks– though Apple, officially, has yet to address it. In the end, after reading several posts on several different boards, I cobbled together the following fix:
1) Rather than have an IP address assigned to my MacBook automatically by the AirPort router, I assigned myself an IP address manually. (To do this, you must call up System Preferences, go to Networks, click the Advanced button, select the TCP/IP tab, and set “Configure IPv4” to Manually. To come up with an IP address, I used the first three numbers from our router’s IP address — visible in this same window — and chose a unique fourth and final number between 1 and 255.)
2) Under the DNS tab, I deleted all existing DNS entries and entered 4.2.2.1 and 4.2.2.2.
At first this made no difference at all, so I went to be pretty glum. And then, miraculously, this morning the MacBook worked just fine, getting blazing fast speeds! I rejoiced! I sang! I danced!
For fifteen minutes. Then, mysteriously, the MacBook slowed down to sub-telephone-modem speeds again.
I pay a premium for Apple products because I expect them to just work. (Heck, I even wrote a book about it!) Unless a Genius at the local Apple Store can provide a fix, this MacBook goes right back to Apple tonight.
Hi,As a fellow Mac owner (and hoping to upgrade to a new MacBook in a few months), I’m anxiously awaiting the outcome of your saga. Meanwhile, while researching another network issue (no, not Apple, it was Linksys), I found a mention that Leopard (and possibly newer MacBooks?) evidently likes wireless-N networks. I don’t know if this helps, but you could check it out.
Anyway, let all know when you can get on…..
helloTERRIBLY SLOW INTERNET EMAILS ETC , BUT SUPERFAST INTERNET STREAMING ETCmy macbook pro 2g ram works perfectly for some internet pages – those that don’t need information typed in – youtube can run on several windows at once with no problems HOWEVER STUFF LIKE TRYING TO DO YAHOO EMAIL, OR BOOK TICKETS, OR LOOK AT MY EBAY ACCOUNT ARE VIRTUALLY IMPOSSIBLE – IT TAKES 2 OR 3 MINUTES TO DOWNLOAD EVERY SINGLE PAGE! – WHAT’S WRONG?I’ve searched help pages etc but not found this exact problem elsewhere yet – can anyone help please??i’ve tried on firefox instead of safari but no better- i’m using talk talk broadmand – wireless router but also with ethernet -no difference -the email pages or pages with forms on virtually freeze – though i can always go to another website and download video, music streaming superfast…?any ideas??thanks