Did Apple change the signal strength scale with AirPort 4.2?

Since I am in a hotel room with a reliable, but fluctuating wifi signal, I can't verify this, but Avi Flax wrote in with the following:

"I just installed the just-released Airport Software 4.2 update, and after rebooting I noticed that Apple seems to have changed the scale that the Airport icon uses to display signal strength. Before reboot, the icon was consistently at 2-3 bars. Afterwards, it's steady on 4, which should indicate a 100% signal, which made me a bit dubious. I doubted that the software update would have improved signal that much. So I launched the always-handy APGrapher, and verified that the signal strength hadn't changed at all, and was still around 40-45% - a far cry from the 100% that the Airport icon now implies. This doesn't actually bother me or anything, I just think it's worth noting. It reminds me of automakers removing oil pressure gages from car dashboards because of people worrying about their oil pressure, or making engine temp gages stay in the middle except in the case of emergencies. These changes were only made possible by engines becoming much more reliable, so wireless technology may one day be able to eliminate signal gages in the same vein."

Can anyone else confirm this behavior?

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Since I am in a hotel room with a reliable, but fluctuating wifi signal, I can't verify this, but Avi Flax wrote in with the...

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Ron Kern

After updating airport, I get a dialog box regarding access for my keychain. The choices are "Don't Change" and "Change All." I guess I'm just stupid, but I cannot figure out which of these choices will grant access.

July 18 2005 at 11:51 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

carpeicthus

UGH. Why did they do that? I don't care about my connection speed. I want to know if I'm getting a signal or not. Maybe because connection speed is a more useful metric. If you aren't getting a signal, your speed will be awfully slow

July 16 2005 at 2:22 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

aki

I upgraded. Although it was operating before, it will not change with the strength of a signal conversely. I am the environment of Panther (10.3.9). What is different ?

July 15 2005 at 8:00 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Adam

Keep in mind that what you're seeing isn't a percent signal, rather you're looking at the decibel strength of the signal. Remember that decibels are on a 10*log scale, and that is why you'll never see a 100"%" signal -- rather, the 70 that I get sitting right next to the station is about as good as it will ever get. Sure, this complicates things a little more when trying to figure out how strong the signal is, but that's okay. Further, the "max" of the signal is 0 db, and the actual range of the signal is in the negative region of the graph. Yay for my antenna design class.

July 15 2005 at 4:09 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Laurie

Logan, yes it's mine... scroll up to where I answered that question from someone else earlier :) http://www.tuaw.com/2005/07/14/did-apple-change-the-signal-strength-scale-with-airport-4-2/#c38005

July 15 2005 at 3:42 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Logan Kugler

Laurie, Is that picture a picture of your desktop? If so, how did you get the clock to display like that? Mine displays all black and a bigger font. Thanks in advance. Logan

July 15 2005 at 3:04 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

bananagrabber

Jack, I liked your Spinal Tap reference, if no one else did. :)

July 15 2005 at 12:57 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

superg

for the date and time in the menubar, use wClock. It's free and it works great too. When you click on the time, a little calendar pops down so you don't have to to iCal just to know what day of the week your girlfriends birthday is.

July 15 2005 at 11:45 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

paul

UGH. Why did they do that? I don't care about my connection speed. I want to know if I'm getting a signal or not.

July 15 2005 at 10:15 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

thoughton

I just upgraded, dont notice any difference in my Airporot whatsoever. > Tony is on the right track, but I think it indicates > signal quality, not strength or bandwith. What is the difference between quality and strength?

July 15 2005 at 9:15 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply