Linux Mint 15 64bit and wireless frequently dropping

Has anyone experienced an odd issue with Linux Mint 15 and the wifi adapter of an Acer Aspire s3-391 frequently dropping connectivity when its within 4 feet of the wireless access point? I have an ASUS EA66 gigabit wireless access point on NETGEAR Prosafe VPN gigabit firewall directly connected to Verizon FiOS (that router's radio is switched off). All my Alienware laptops, Apple Macbooks Pros and iPhones and iPads, Android Tablets and Smartphones have no issues, but this Acer built with Linux when it is within 4 feet of this access point constantly drops, sometimes with no reconnecting unless you reboot it. Seriously, I have to have it more than 4 feet away to not have it drop, and it stays consistently on when it is further away from the access point. This is the first I experienced of this on any platform that the device's wireless drops when too close to its wifi source rather than because its too far away.

I tried updating the drivers on this unit, but didn't make any difference. Someone mentioned that its a channel issue, but I logged into the ASUS AP and experimented with all the different channel settings to no avail. Anyone out there with a possible solution, I would appreciate posting it, thanks.

 

First of all, what wireless card is in that Aspire? It certainly seems like that's your culprit - be it for lack of proper driver support in Mint, or just less-then-stellar hardware portion...

 

Its Wireless Atheros WIFI WLAN AR5B22, I must add that before I wiped Windows 7 off it to install Linux Mint 15 that i had no issues with in at any range. This all started right from after Linux build, so I might want to agree with you that it is a Linux issue, but what troubles me is that this only happens at 4 foot distance and closer to my access point and never drops when its further away than 4 feet. If it were driver would it not fail regardless of the distance? I was going to open it and see if I can change out the wifi for another choice like broadcom or intel...

 

Get some logging output and that will point towards the problem.

Run wpa_supplicant in the foreground with verbose messages sent to the terminal (it's usually called as a daemon by network_manager without a log file):

Code:

sudo killall wpa_supplicant && sudo wpa_supplicant -ddtu

explanation (from wpa_supplicant manpage):

Look at /var/log/syslog while it drops.

Code:

tail -f /var/log/syslog

Paste in here what you see in both and we can take it from there.

 

Using those scripts does it send the data to a log file on the drive, or I just cut and paste whats on the terminal window?

Hope I don't sound to newbie, with from out of aviation & computer tech school and several novell, lotus, and microsoft certifications later down 24 years and self employed IT Consultant, I must sadly state that I'm new to the Linux universe and feel a bit lost in here! But I am fascinated by it and the whole movement of free shared software.

 

/var/log/syslog is an actual file. wpa_supplicant usually doesn't have a log file as configured out of the box, so you start it in a terminal and its output is sent there. If you want to send its output to a file instead use the -f option followed by a filename (if confused see man wpa_supplicant).

 

Sorry for the delay in posting, I had gotten a little busier with support calls. I tried this and it produced a rather large log file that I cannot upload here. In any event I ended up blowing out that configuration, I installed Xubuntu 12.04 "Voyager Linux" which I wanted to see how it performed, well I ended up not liking it, at least on this model laptop. So I am going to wipe it out and reinstall Olivia, lets see what happens. thanks to Allurgroceries for the posted help. If I come across the same problem, I will report back here.

 

I would try a fresh install of Mint 13 LTS found here:
Linux Mint 13 "Maya" - Cinnamon (64-bit) - Linux Mint

Linux Mint 13 "Maya" - MATE (64-bit) - Linux Mint
Interested in your final outcome
Best regards,
Cleve

 

If this happens only, or much more frequently, when running off battery, you try to disable the wireless card power management: sudo iwconfig wlan0 power off