Microwave interferes with wifi?

[graylocks]

my son's been complaining for a while that his internet connection gets messed up whenever i use the microwave. i was blowing him off but i've finally figured out that he's right. i listen to internet radio streams and whenever i heat up my frozen berries, iTunes goes into rebuffering. it doesn't happen right away; takes about 45 to 60 seconds or so.

is this normal? do i have a leak from the microwave that shouldn't be happening? is the interference any kind of health hazard?

[freeradical]

This seems odd; the frequencies are widely separated.

[RgrF]

Stop eating.

[Robert M]

Graylocks.

It's a common issue. Annoying but common. The big honking microwave oven my parents have at their house constantly interferes with their wireless network. I changed the channel used by the router (and boosters) and that reduced the amount of interference. Didn't get rid of it entirely but it was a vast improvement. Microwave ovens even interfere with 2.4 GHz cordless telephones. Again, changing the channel used by the phone usually results in a noticeable improvement.

Robert

[graylocks]

freeradical wrote:
This seems odd; the frequencies are widely separated.

even not knowing much about that aspect of science, that was my original assumption which is why i blew him off. but i just tested and it's definitely happening. oddly enough, i first tested at 40% power (didn't want to over warm my coffee) and nothing happened. hmmm. so i put some water in a bowl and ran the microwave at full power. internet stream cut out after 20 seconds. i stopped the microwave and the stream resumed. i started the microwave again; stream cut out in 15 seconds. i stopped the microwave - stream resumes.

[kj4btkljv]

graylocks wrote:
Oddly enough, i first tested at 40% power (didn't want to over warm my coffee) and nothing happened.

You could just run at 40% power for the rest of it's life. Just think of all the money you'll save on your electric bill!



Jeff

[RAMd®d]

Normal for 2.4GHz WiFi.

I don't have a problem when using 5GHz WiFi.

"Power" setting most often adjust the duration of the generation of microwaves. "Low" power, under these circumstances would be brief interruptions that WiFi might deal with. Higher power settings would then mean longer duration of microwave activity and your WiFi would be disrupted.

[AlphaDog]

Well, see, it goes like this: Microwaves exhaust heat, so the air coming out of the microwave while it's being used is blowing the wifi signal off course. The higher the setting on the microwave, the stronger the flow of air.

OK, moving on. What you're experiencing sounds pretty much like what was happening to my wireless signal when my late husband used his treadmill. When he was using it at one speed, there was no interference, but when he reduced the speed, I completely lost my wireless signal. It was a whole lot easier to simply adapt than try to figure out the exact reason why it was happening and then try to fix it.

[Carnos Jax]

I can only guess in all these circumstances that the devices must be generating noise in the frequency ranges of WiFi (or maybe it's a harmonic?).

[Zoidberg]

Has happened here too, to my wife's Mac. The Airport Extreme is in my office, and there's a number of walls between me and her office. If the microwave runs, we'll lose some (or all) of the signal. The Airport Express in the kitchen (attached to the radio) will also completely cut out if it's streaming iTunes. The kids' Mac (on the floor almost right above me) will not lose any signal at all that we've noticed.