X201T Wireless Issues: Lots of "no internet access" when walking around within a large network

[wustlumdnj]

I have a two month old X201T; a few weeks ago the wireless started acting strangely at times - a couple phenomena may explain the abnormality:

1. I use my laptop on two college campuses.  I have wireless set up on each of them.  The error occurs when I move from one side of a campus to the other.  Naturally, there are many wireless routers set up across a campus and notebooks are (I'm assuming) supposed to switch from one to the next seamlessly as to maintain the connection to the network.  This worked fine on my 6 year old Dell I just replaced with this computer. 

When the error started occurring, as I walk from one area of campus maybe 30 feet away, my connection to the internet ceases (though my connection to the wireless network, access connections and windows wireless state, have not).  The windows wireless states that my connection has "no internet access".  I have a feeling that the wireless card may be clinging to the same router where it first connects instead of actively seeking the closest one, but I'm a n00b so I could be wrong.  This occurs on both campuses. My old laptop still works fine on each. 

2. This is another phenomenon that could help explain the lack of internet connection I get when moving around on campus as stated above.  When I am at my house I use my home network.  When I take my laptop out of my house, get in my car, and drive two miles in any direction, the X201T says I am still connected to my house wireless connection, but according to windows wireless icon there is "no internet access".  If my 6 year old Dell can handle refreshing the wireless networks while I walk around it, why isn't this laptop able to do it? I have to disable the wireless adaptor and re-enable it for the X201T to say, 'oh we're not in your house anymore, these are the wireless networks in the area', instead of clinging to my wireless network and stating there's no internet access.

Anyone know what settings I should mess with?  I would also settle for anyone helping me wipe all my network settings clean to factory settings, because this issue did not show up until a couple weeks ago and the X201T was handling internet connections fine when I first started using it.  I would *really* like to fix this without restoring the whole computer to factory settings, which would involve me having to remove all my documents and have my IT department grudgingly reinstall a bunch of software.

Thank you for your assistance

Specs: Windows 7 Professional 64bit, i7 CPU, 2 GB RAM, Centrino Advanced-N 6200 AGN.

[topmahof Community Moderator]

are you using lenovo's access connections or windows wireless?  

[wustlumdnj]

I am using windows wireless service for my main network that is having issues. I also have networks on access connections. Should i be only using one?

[topmahof Community Moderator]

people will probably argue with me but i only use windows.  i used access connections for awhile and it always seemed to want to take over all the time. i never could completely disable it. so i uninstalled it and just used windows. i never seem to have problems.  i'm all over the place too.  i like to be able to open my machine and see that it is connected.  if it isn't, it isn't a big deal to right click the icon and view networks and connect to one. with access connections there's more to it than that.  at any rate if you just want to clean it up, uninstall access connections and reinstall it. that should clean up all the crap that's been building up there.

if you liked the way the dell worked, then use windows coz that's what your dell used, right?  in windows 7 when you bring up a network there's that option to connect automatically. if it's one of your frequent networks click it. when it's the strongest, windows should just connect to it.  in devices, right click your wireless adapter, properties, power management, make sure that "allow the computer to turn off this device to save power" is unchecked.

if you're using both, you're probably getting some conflicts along the way. i would just use one.  

there's a few more settings in windows, i have to research those a little, i'll get back to you in a bit.

[topmahof Community Moderator]

http://howto.techworld.com/mobile-wireless/438/make-your-wlan-roam-faster/

here's a nice little article on roaming and access points. you can tweak these settings by changing the roam time in seconds and the roam time threshold.  these settings are under the advanced tab when you right click your wireless adapter in device manager.  i would not set up a lot of profiles there seems to be doubt about that.  hogs up the system.