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MiFi 4510L does not appear in available netwroks. Can't connect device.

I can't seem to get my MiFi 4510L to show up in the available networks on seveal devices and it is driving me nuts.

Here is what's happening..I turn the thing on and it goes through its Green-Purple dance and then settles on a solid green - that means I have 4G from what I have read. I have 5 bars and a full battery yet it will not show as an available Network on any of my devices.

I pulled the battery, resat the SIM card, did a reset but still nothing. Call Tech and they shipped me a new one...

Put the old battery and SIM in and turned it on...it should up for a minute on my iPad (RIP SJ) & laptop but then disappeared. Now no matter what I do it won't appear as an available network.

Now the minute I take it outside, there it is..no problems and lightening fast. I take it inside (I can see where I was outside from my window), not a peep...**bleep**? It this thing so sketchy that a window is gonna make or break it? Does the 5 bars & solid green mean something other than "all is good"? Before you ask, I have already checked with the dog and he is not running a signal jammer..if only it were that easy..

Anyone have any ideas??

Thanks

Comments

mini4mw

I just had the same issue. It was working for 1 week and I was using the connection yesterday. Today I tried to get on tonight and the laptop couldn't see the SSID. I rebooted the device a few times, removed the battery and still no go. I was about to give up and rebooted it once more and then the SSID popped up. I had a nice green 4G light and 3-4 bars for Verizon signal the whole time (when it wasn't rebooting), but no SSID showing up in a laptop right next to it. I read in another post that if the wireless can't auto assign a channel that it may not bring up the wireless network. I only have 3 other wireless networks visible in on the computer (ps I had other computers that could not see the SSID either), so I wouldn't think that is the issue. I almost set the channel to a specific number, but figured I'd let it go and see what happens.

John_Getzke

Hello,

When SSID's do not appear then the first thing that I assume is that the Wireless N mode of the router is interfering with the connection. I always like to shut that mode off for troubleshooting purposes. Although newer computers and devices are Wireless N compatible, they dont always play nice with routers which broadcast in this way.

To disable Wireless N:

1. Power on the MiFi

2. Navigate to Http://mifi.admin

3. Sign into the MiFi with your Router Password

a. The default is "admin"

4. Click on the Wi-Fi tab

5. Change the 802.11 Mode to "802.11g + 802.11b"

6. Click Apply

mini4mw

The smart phone and one of 2 computers do not have wireless N hardware and could still not see the mifi. I leave my mifi on all the time, plugged into the wall. I turned it off for a few hours, turned it back on and the SSID came back. I'll try turning if off at night when I'm done and turning it on in the morning when I know it will be used. I'm wondering the the wifi part goes to sleep and won't wake up, if the wifi channel needs to be forced (not auto) or perhaps it is something with the N band, but I need the N band as the one computer that has it is far enough away the G isn't capable of reaching.

John_Getzke

The MiFI 4510L has a built in Dormancy feature (not configurable) which will temporarily close the internet connection after a few moments of no activity. We can "wake up" the device from dormant mode by requesting new websites/emails/etc. You can watch your device go in and out of dormancy on one of the diagnostic screens of the MiFi router page. There is also a power save feature which will power down the device after 30 minutes of no activity (this feature is configurable).

That being said, the SSID should always be broadcasting when the device is powered on, even when the device is in its dormant mode. You might want to get Verizon involved to determine if your MiFi is defective. If it is defective then they should be able to replace it with a new one under the warranty.

mini4mw

This is purely (I believe) an SSID/wifi issue. I've been in the mifi admin page and I have seen it come out of dormant state when the Internet hasn't been accessed in awhile. When I don't see the SSID on a wireless N or G device, the LCD read out has 3-4 bars for the Verizon connection with the green light solid (4G connection, no traffic). There are no hosts connected, signified by the small radio buttons at the bottom of the LCD. So far turning it off over night has resolved the issue, however it took a week for the issue to pop up the last time. I'll update again if this fixes the issue for me.

mini4mw

Well today it wouldn't power on. reset sim, factory reset a few times but all it does is turn on few 1-2 seconds and then back off. I get a green LED and the Verizon antenna comes up with 2-3 bars on the LCD and almost immediately LCD goes white, LED goes amber until its back off. Battery fully charged (4 bars in LCD) and unit is plugged into the wall. I left it alone for 4 hours, same issue. I called Verizon and went through the whole scenario and they are going to send another mifi out to replace this one (its only 3 weeks old) and we'll see if that fixes up the issue. Hopefully that will fix everything up.

John_Getzke

Mini,

Your problem is not common with the MiFi 4510L. Verizon replacing the device sounds appropriate given the information you have shared with us so far. Keep us posted if the problem comes back with the new MiFi.

mini4mw

I've replaced the 4510. The new one doesn't have the power issue, but after having it on for 48hrs the SSID disappeared from 2 laptops. One dell win7 ultimate w/ wireless g, the other win7 home w/ wireless n. After a few reboots of the mifi and pcs, the wireless g pc had the mifi up, but the wireless n pc still couldn't see it when sitting next to the mifi. I changed mifi to wireless b/g, but the wireless n computer still couldn't see the mifi (should have auto downgraded). I changed the mifi to open security from wpa2 personal and changed mifi back to b/g/n wireless networks. Now both see the SSID. I didn't want to leave it open, so I changed to WEP 64bit. Both computers still see the mifi and are connecting normally. I'll leave it here and see if perhaps the wpa2 security might be causing an issue.

mini4mw

After changing the wireless security from WPA2 to WEP 64bit I haven't had any more SSID disappearance problems. I've had the device on 24x7 for the past week or so. It would appear there is some security issue or perhaps config issue on my side that is causing the WPA2 security to not show the SSID to show up after 24 hours or so. I read on some google searches that the Uverse routers have a similar issue. At some point I'll try WPA or WEP 128 bit encryption, but for right now I'm just happy with it working and not having to mess with it. Consider it fixed.

John_Getzke

Mini,

Another thread was working on a similar problem with disappering SSID's. The conclusion that they reached was that they had too many competing wireless signals in the area. They changed the channel that the SSID was being broadcasted on and reported a improvement. Here is a link to the thread:

http://community.vzw.com/t5/Broadband-Netbook-Devices/Mifi-4510l-will-not-Broadcast-SSID/m-p/687739#M7206

To summarize, here are the steps the OP found to resolve his problem:

1. Use a wifi tool like "http://tools.meraki.com/stumbler#q=" to find wifi networks in the area you are having a problem. I used a very very slow public network.

2. See which channels and 802.11 protocols are least used. In my case only channels 1,6 and 11 were being used and all were 802.11 B or G.

3. make a note of above.

4. connect mifi to verizon in non congested area, and ssid should be broadcast.

5. point browser to 192.68.1.6. (<----This is your default gateway if you check IPConfig)

6. change wifi settings to something that will work in your congested area. I chose the 802.11n protocol and wifi channel 4.

7. try mifi in congested area.

Garyalp

I have the Novotel T1114, however I had the same problem. Worked great out of the box for a few months. Had a storm and the power went out at the house. Even though the battery was good I lost the mifi in my laptop and wifi extender. After a couple of days of pulling my hair out I tried changing the band Ghz from 5 to 2.5. That did it. Both the extender and my laptop are now connected to the mifi. If your model has the same option than try changing the Mgz Band. I went to: 192.168.1.1 Settings: Advanced Settings: and the option to change Mgz was there. Dont forget to click on SAVE CHANGES .

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