Wifi limited connectivity

[Alexgpl]

It's since I don't know when that my SP3 i7 has issues with wifi. Rarely not connecting or connection dropping but constantly windows (8.1) says: limited connectivity. Neither last firware update changed anything.
I tried varius solutions found on the web but zero effects. Does anybody has the same?
Ah, it happens with various connections, it's not limited to a single one.

Thanks

 

[leeshor]

When you say various connections are you referring to multiple locations, like outside of your local network?

 

[Alexgpl]

When you say various connections are you referring to multiple locations, like outside of your local network?

Yes, multiple locations so different access points

 

[buers]

I have my SP3 since December 2014. At that time, I started to lurk here and I saw several threads about WIFI connectivity issues. I was happy to not see any such issues myself. (However, I was and still am a bit dissapointed about network speed with WIFI and rather high CPU usage, when transferring lots of data.)

A couple of weeks ago, I first saw limited connectivity at home. It seems to happen more often lately, but not always. Typically, I see it after the device wakes up from hibernation and/or after I come back from another location.

Unfortunately, I really can't remember, when this happened first. Maybe with the May firmware update, maybe earlier.

 

[bluegrass]

When I see it, I just disconnect and reconnect. If that doesn't fix it, I power down my SP and power on again.

 

[buers]

Same here. Disconnect and reconnect seems always to help. I never had to do this some months ago, however. No obvious change in my envirnment since then.

 

[N.G.]

I am convinced it is a Electro-Magnetic Compatibility/Interference problem with the Marvell wifi bluetooth device. I fought it for years on 2 SP1s, a S2s, and 3 SP3s. Went through many mice, and upgraded/ replaced my wifi router/network several times. Spent a lot of money. Installed an external wifi adapter once, which worked fine till a SP1 update took it off line. Finally, 8 months ago, I turned bluetooth off on all of them and converted to USB attached mice. Had excellent wifi performance since on all of them. Incidentally, I have a Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet 10, which does not have this problem, and also does not have the Marvell chip.

I think it is possible that the problem doesn't exist with low power bluetooth, but never seen a statement from Marvell or Microsoft to that effect, or decent experimental verification.

Could be that Microsoft firmware updates have eliminated the problem, but not worth it to me to confirm.

 

[GreyFox7]

I am convinced it is a Electro-Magnetic Compatibility/Interference problem with the Marvell wifi bluetooth device. I fought it for years on 2 SP1s, a S2s, and 3 SP3s. Went through many mice, and upgraded/ replaced my wifi router/network several times. Spent a lot of money. Installed an external wifi adapter once, which worked fine till a SP1 update took it off line. Finally, 8 months ago, I turned bluetooth off on all of them and converted to USB attached mice. Had excellent wifi performance since on all of them. Incidentally, I have a Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet 10, which does not have this problem, and also does not have the Marvell chip.

I think it is possible that the problem doesn't exist with low power bluetooth, but never seen a statement from Marvell or Microsoft to that effect, or decent experimental verification.

Could be that Microsoft firmware updates have eliminated the problem, but not worth it to me to confirm.

You would think if BlueTooth is OFF this would not happen BUT it still does even when using 5ghz connection.

They regressed and while I never had the problem before I do now for the last month to six weeks.

 

[Alexgpl]

The strange thing is that I can surf on internet, network is OK, but it almost always says "Limited connectivity" and it loses almost always wifi passwords...

 

[N.G.]

It sees the networks, remembers them, but loses the passwords?

 

[buers]

@GreyFox7, what your are describing is almost identical to what I was describing.

Do you have any suspicion, about the cause. Any specific update, that might be the source of the issue? Or do you rahter suspect your environment?

I am personally not aware, what specifically might have caused the degression of the Wifi connectivity. I live in a house with many Wifi access points in my direct neighborhood - something might have changed there. Of the about one dozen Wifi devices we use in our flat, only the SP3 started to have those issues, which might point to a software update, that made things worse here. I am not aware, that I have reconfigured anything lately (neither on the SP3, nor on the router, nor on the other Wifi devices).

Other then Alexgpl, I really have no connection to the internet, when the SP3 shows limited connectivity.

 

[Alexgpl]

It sees the networks, remembers them, but loses the passwords?

It sees networks, I can surf with limited connectivity and after rebooting or sleep it forgets the password. And anyway I had me too poor connectivity compared with other devices.
Honestly wifi is super bugged, terrible. I like SP3 but I refuse to buy a wifi dongle...