WiFi issues, but only on iPhones?

[eltax91]

Hi folks

I’m seriously starting to lose my patience here. My setup is a video modem, Fortigate 60D firewall, both hiding in the garage with an old eBay Cisco PoE switch.

Then I’ve got two fortiiAP 210b PoE access points in the middle of the house, one upstairs and one down. (Spot the guy who used to work for Fortinet )

What’s driving me nuts is that everything works fine except two iPhones. All the wires devices like TVs, laptops and server get the full 40 odd MB that my broadband has to offer. Wireless laptops and 2 different generation iPads run at about 20MB. No problem.

Then there my Mrs iPhone XR and my ageing 6s. Both recently just started to to run so slowly. 0.2mb at this mornings test. 4G works fine. I think other wifi works fine but obviously not able to test currently.

Has anyone any crumb of info for me to go on? I’m ready to bin the entire WiFi and firewall setup at this rate!

[Tony1963]

Try a different channel?

[Scooobydont]

Is your wireless 2.4ghz or 5ghz? I have seen some apple products struggle to connect on 5ghz.

[Sheepshanks]

We had issues that seemed to be trying to hang on to 5g when out of range. Everything works fine with it off.

Also, try, as test, without security.

[MitchT]

Scooobydont said:

Is your wireless 2.4ghz or 5ghz? I have seen some apple products struggle to connect on 5ghz.

This.

My hub was initially set up to blend the 2.4GHz and 5GHz signals together but my old MacBook Pro (2008) started dropping its connection all the time and then refusing to reconnect. After doing a lot of digging online I discovered that you need to split the 2.4GHz and 5GHz signals and name them accordingly, so you know which is which. When you scan for a wi-fi signal you'll then see both as though there are two separate signals and can choose the right one for the product you're trying to connect. Products that won't connect to 5GHz (in my case my 2008 MacBook Pro and my iPhone 4S) will happily connect to 2.4GHZ. That fixed my MacBook Pro issue. The iPhone 4S was always happy on the blended signal so never a problem. I'm now running a 2017 MacBook Pro and an iPhone 8 which are both happy on 5GHz, so I guess it's just the age of the product that's the issue.

[eltax91]

WifI is all running on 2.4 GHZ. The "profile" on the fortigate shows the two radios, one is 5GHz and one 2.4 GHz, the SSID is only applied to the 2.4 GHz radio.

[Somebody]

Have you manually configured IP addresses on the iphones? My experience of iphone connection issues have been to do with conflict of assigned IP addresses.

[VEX]

Also which access point are you iPhones connected to when you did the test.

iOS devices are a nightmare in Wi-fi if you have multiple access points. Setting up clients systems I walk toward and be stood next to a working access point with an iOS device and because it can still see the original one it was connected to it won’t home unless I force it to.

I have to adjust Wi-fi powers to ensure there is enough signal for coverage but low enough to maximise hopping and best coverage.

V

[eltax91]

VEX said:

Also which access point are you iPhones connected to when you did the test.

iOS devices are a nightmare in Wi-fi if you have multiple access points. Setting up clients systems I walk toward and be stood next to a working access point with an iOS device and because it can still see the original one it was connected to it won’t home unless I force it to.

I have to adjust Wi-fi powers to ensure there is enough signal for coverage but low enough to maximise hopping and best coverage.

V

The fortinet is actually pretty good at handing over. They are almost always connected to the nearest one.

[Bikerjon]

Check the channel width too. 20Mhz is safer for the 2.4Ghz band.