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General discussion

The Wii Wireless Card Sucks

by bevillan Mar 12, 2007 12:58AM PDT

So I finally bought a Wii and was a little disappointed that the wireless card sucks so bad. It is a mere 3 feet away from my wireless router with a receiver between the two. I was able to run a successful connection to my network but when I wanted to connect to the internet the signal was too weak. I powered down my receiver to see if there was any interference from it but no dice.

Nintendo in all its wisdom decided to not give me a wired option to go directly from the Wii to the router (unless there is some accessory for it) and made their internal wireless card so crappy that it cannot have a strong signal from a router 3 feet away. Way to go Nintendo, now give me a way to hard wire my Wii to my router.

Discussion is locked

10 Posts
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Mine's super.
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Mar 12, 2007 1:05AM PDT

It works better than a PC in the same room. There are 2 walls inbetween the router and the Wii.

-> Here's a tip. My router didn't work with the PC in the same room out of the box. A new version of firmware saved it from being returned. What others also discover is that while one PC may work fine, their new PC won't connect. Again it can be the firmware in the router.

Bob

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firmware
by bevillan Mar 12, 2007 1:08AM PDT

I will look for updates for the router but I did update it just a couple weeks ago and 3 of the PCs in my house work fine wirelessly.

I ran the initial connection test to download the latest patch for the Wii and it connected and downloaded it (slowly) but when I went to WiiConnect24 setup the internet connection test failed so I don't know what else to do other than buy the wired LAN adapter (just found out that Nintendo makes one)

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Other things.
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Mar 12, 2007 4:21AM PDT

My neighbor was also in a similar fix. His DSL/modem/router/wap (allinone) needed a firmware update. But beyond that we found the new neighbors were on the same channel 11 as he was. The firmware helped a little but then I brought over my older laptop that does a nifty site survey trick. We spotted the channel congestion and since no neighbor was spotted on channel 1 we changed to that.

It worked much better.

Bob

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works fine here
by javierft Mar 13, 2007 2:12PM PDT

Hey,
I have my wireless router in my basement and my WII upstairs on the first floor and it works fine. What type of router do you have and how many people in your area also have wireless? Theres works pretty well, but one thing you could do if you wanted to hardwire it would be to purchase a usb rj45 connector and use that for a hard-wire. Just a shame you can't go wireless in your house.

Javi

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linksys
by bevillan Mar 14, 2007 3:33AM PDT

I have a Linksys Wireless-G router and it is pretty modern so it should be fine. I think because I live in an apartment complex and there are alot of other wireless signals available it is messing with the Wii's card. I'll make sure I have it synched to the right channel but none of my other wireless electronics have trouble connecting. The USB hard-wire adapter is only $25 I guess so if all else fails I'll use that.

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I finally sucked it up...
by csliva11 Mar 15, 2007 1:16AM PDT

and bought the LAN adapter which made a HUGE difference.

Sucked to pay 30 bucks for a small piece of plastic though.

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cool
by bevillan Mar 15, 2007 1:44AM PDT

Yeah I think I will have to do the same thing because I messed with the LAN settings on the Wii and nothing seemed to give me a stronger signal. I guess I can't expect much from a console that is $250 and has an internal wireless card.

I still can't believe that it has trouble connecting strongly to my wireless router that is 3 feet away when the 3 PCs in my house work just fine. At least Nintendo should have included a ethrenet port and saved us the $30 for the adapater.

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agreed
by csliva11 Mar 15, 2007 2:05AM PDT

but Nintendo is comprised of a bunch of shrewd business men/women who are concerned with making money (can't really blame them, all companies are).

They're not concerned with making the customer happy. Their concern is making the customer "happy enough." Then comes the nickel and diming.

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regarding Wii
by prakashsi Apr 7, 2007 8:48AM PDT

at least you could get wireless working. I bought a brand new Linksys Wireless-G (WRT54GL) and set it up to my main desktop (win 2000). I have an @Home broadband connection. i can't get my laptop or my Wii to connect to the internet. i set it up as a DHCP and have set it so that my laptop chooses an IP address automatically & no WEP is on. it says it is connected but neither the laptop nor the wii are allowing me to logon....can someone please help me? i live in a studio and the signal is showing all 5 bars so i don't know what is up.

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Link about firmware and the MAC (address)
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Apr 8, 2007 12:20AM PDT
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