BlackBerry® PlayBook™

[joe592]

I also have these problems, it is frustrating.  The wifi on the PB is garbage.

[Zildjian71]

Same here just have to keep re-trying.  Sometimes Youtube takes 4+ tries.

Just a note to all you neat freaks...don't stack your router and modem together.  A modem is a HIGH CURRENT device because it has to get the signal all the way back to the source; either DSL or Cable and it radiates a lot of RF noise.  If your modem and router are next to each other your router is constantly re-correctiong bit errors in packets.  Place your modem and router at lease eight feet (about 2.5 Meters) apart so that your router isn't fighting the modem noise.

Also the RF noise from your modem can cause what is called Intermodulation Noise (mixed frequency and amplitude) to your WiFi signal coming from your WiFi devices such as the PB Tablet.  Devices have weaker radios than routers.  The same goes for printers and FAX machines and copiers they are all noisy devices.

The moral to the story is that Modems are bad Karma to weak WiFi signals.

[cas118]

Another little-known fact: the PlayBook wifi speed will be throttled to 200KB/s if it goes into standby.

While copying, make sure that the PlayBook is active and you can see what's on the screen - it's over 10 times faster and much less likely to drop out.

[dc-it]

Has any one tried updating the firmware of the routers?
Check on the manufacturer's website for the latest firmware of your model and download it to your PC then perform the update.
This may solve the WiFi problem.
The other option is change the mode to G from N or mixed if it's an N router.
If the router is several years then it may be time to get a new one since routers are inexpensive.

[fastartcee]

The PB wifi is simply lousy; I've wrestled with it on-and-off for almost a year now.

I just ran a couple speed tests on my ISP, Shaw.ca.

(My wifi info says  'G band;  11 Mbps)

PB:  Ping: 734 ms!   Download: 3.04 mbps   Upload: 0.35 mbps

Re-run:

PB:  Ping: 788 ms!   Download: 3.78 mbps    Upload: 0.34 mbps

And then I rab the test on my old laptop (with a cheap D-Link N-band USB adapter) in the exact same location in our house:

Laptop: Ping: 34 ms   Download  5.52 mbps   Upload: 2.18 mbps

My service plan should give more like 20 mbps download, but in my particular location in our house, I have to use a wifi repeater, so I accept that my speeds should be lower. But at my desktop machine--also using a D-Link N-band USB adapter--I do get downloads at 20 mbps.

So no matter how you cut it, the PB wifi sitnks. But what really bugs me is that no one in RIM monitors these posts and provides either advice or explanations. For a company selling a consumer product, RIM is utterly without a clue, and simply lets us seethe in our frustrations.

[skid902]

I have the same problem but only since I bought a new DLink wireless N router at Christmas (a cheap one). I had hoped OS2 would solve it but no luck. I am going to switch back to my old router, I did not have this problem with that router.

[Lost_at_Sea]

I would suggest you update the router firmware and then reboot the PB.

[christmaspears]

Try turning off your Blackberry Bridge prior to connecting to wifi.  I was able (finally) to connect and turned Blackberry Bridge back on without issue.  This is more of a workaround than a solution but it's working.

[Larry_Luther]

I've tested my PlayBook OS 2.0.1.358 on both my home and work WiFi, network errors on both.  Some are recoverable "Hit retry" others are not.  At home I have 4 iPod Touch's, one iPad, two laptops, one WiFi connected desktop, and one bridge from the TV room and none of them have problems that I can see with the network.  But the PB does...

[Boight]

Fast:  The Shaw speedtest is just wrong, I wrote them to complain about their HTML compatibility with the playbook and no response.

Use speedtest.net. My PB can get close to 30Mbps.  I'm using Shaws Cisco DPC3825 set to mixed mode and TKIP+AES.