Recently purchased M2 Mac Mini won't connect to internet randomly.

[noquelidaniel]

I just bought a M2 Mac Mini to use as a daily driver. I use 2 monitors and an ethernet cable. On day one (Sunday) I used speedtest.net to see if everything was working properly. It was just fine. The only thing that wasn't work was RAVE properly, it kept buffering although the movie was playing in the background.

Later this week (I think after I updated to Sonoma) I started to see some weird glitches related to the connection. Both Wi-FI and Ethernet. They ended on a "couldn't reach this web page" error. And after a few refreshes, it got back working. My ethernet is an ISP and WI-FI is a different one. And both worked just fine on my iPhone while this error happened on the Mac.

I have no clue on what is causing this. I tried to call Apple but neither do they. I tried to erase and reinstall but the error continues. I tried safe mode but the error continues.

When this thing happens, WhatsApp keeps working, stremio keeps working. widgets keep working. Only the browsers stop. And today I noticed that it can occur on specific browsers as well. Safari wasn't accessing anything. But Chrome and Firefox were working like a charm.

I have little to no knowledge of mac as this is my first one, but it looks like something is blocking the signal, like a VPN (i don't have one) or something like that.

I would really appreciate every help as much as possible.

 

[hg.wells]

Do you have iCloud private relay enabled? I was seeing some similar issues and disabling it fixed it

 

[noquelidaniel]

Do you have iCloud private relay enabled? I was seeing some similar issues and disabling it fixed it

I do have it enabled but on my phone. On the iCloud mac settings it's 'off'. Does this have anything to do with it? Should I disable it on the phone as well?

 

[hg.wells]

I do have it enabled but on my phone. On the iCloud mac settings it's 'off'. Does this have anything to do with it? Should I disable it on the phone as well?

If it’s not enabled on your Mac it’s unlikely.

 

[noquelidaniel]

If it’s not enabled on your Mac it’s unlikely.

I hate this feeling of not knowing what to do, but having a feeling that is just a configuration problem.

The Internet is working, but now I just can't access Google (google and google drive) properly. Everything else is working as it should.

I get this error:

 

[Bigwaff]

Make sure wifi is disabled on your Mac while using ethernet, vice versa. Curious whether the connection issues persist. You can also connect to the hotspot on your iPhone and see if you still have these connection issues.

 

[ipaqrat]

it FEELS less Layer 1 (the link, Ether/WIFI), more cert-y, or DNS-y... And the sporadic nature of it feels like expiring session or certificate time-to-live... 🧐 <retreives dousing wand>

Firefox has Secure DNS settings. Chrome, too. This allows the browser to diverge from Mac OS settings. In the MacOS, there's no setting labeled "Secure DNS" on the Mac, but you can check network settings for each connection (DNS servers might be listed as 1.1.1.1 or 8.8.8.8, or some other similar secure host).

Also, isolate the network connection as you troubleshoot by turning off Wifi when using ether, and vice versa. Also, make sure your Mac isn't reaching out to your PHONE'S hotspot when using WIFI

Might be helpful to eliminate DNA as a culprit. Using a device that works, retrieving the actual IP address for a site that's failing, then use the IP in the borked browser's address bar. Here, I just pinged the URL in MacOS Terminal.

This wouldn't support a course of action, per se, but DNS is ordinarily a crucial link between remembering MacRumors exists, and viewing a page. (I know, I know... My ping time is pathetic. Out in horse country, we're lucky to get tMobile 5G extended)

More brainstorming, here; I really got nothing more without some test results. Even with results, I'm kinda stupid.

• Is it possible that your phone is sync'ing certain web site settings that aren't compatible with desktop versions of sites? Non-issue without an iPhone
• Could the issue be compounded by Hand-Off?? Again, non-issue without an iPhone.
• Was the Mini procured used from an enterprise managed environment (where it got an enterprise management agent that might prevent a truly clean reinstall (I deploy this sort of security/monitoring software routinely in my line of work).
• I'd be curious to see what a Virtual Machine would do, like if you just happen to have a Windows ARM VM in vmWare Fusion or in Parallels.

 

[za9ra22]

To me this sounds like a DNS problem. With the internet up and accessible outside a browser, but the browser being unable to access a site, it strongly suggests DNS lookup isn't resolving the site IP.

When this happens, in the browser, enter 142.250.191.78 as the destination address (no https or www, just the IP)

This is Google's primary IP address. If when you hit enter, you get Google's home page, then likely you're having a DNS lookup problem on the Mac.

Personally, I'd put Google's DNS server addresses (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4) in the DNS settings in your Network settings pane and see if that resolves the problem more broadly.

​

 

[noquelidaniel]

To me this sounds like a DNS problem. With the internet up and accessible outside a browser, but the browser being unable to access a site, it strongly suggests DNS lookup isn't resolving the site IP.

When this happens, in the browser, enter 142.250.191.78 as the destination address (no https or www, just the IP)

This is Google's primary IP address. If when you hit enter, you get Google's home page, then likely you're having a DNS lookup problem on the Mac.

Personally, I'd put Google's DNS server addresses (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4) in the DNS settings in your Network settings pane and see if that resolves the problem more broadly.

​

I just inserted Google's DNS as you said. Let's see if the problem persists.

 

[noquelidaniel]

Make sure wifi is disabled on your Mac while using ethernet, vice versa. Curious whether the connection issues persist. You can also connect to the hotspot on your iPhone and see if you still have these connection issues.

It persists on both cases! iphone hotspot and with wi-fi turned off.

 

[Bigwaff]

It persists on both cases! iphone hotspot and with wi-fi turned off.

Uninstall any Safari extensions you may have installed. You don't happen to have any networking utilities installed.. Radio Silence, Little Snitch, etc. ... or VPN software?

 

[noquelidaniel]

Uninstall any Safari extensions you may have installed. You don't happen to have any networking utilities installed.. Radio Silence, Little Snitch, etc. ... or VPN software?

Nope! I don't have any extensions whatsoever and I don't use any VPN. Also, this installation of Sonoma is almost vanilla since I just erased the OS.

 

[noquelidaniel]

it FEELS less Layer 1 (the link, Ether/WIFI), more cert-y, or DNS-y... And the sporadic nature of it feels like expiring session or certificate time-to-live... 🧐 <retreives dousing wand>

Firefox has Secure DNS settings. Chrome, too. This allows the browser to diverge from Mac OS settings. In the MacOS, there's no setting labeled "Secure DNS" on the Mac, but you can check network settings for each connection (DNS servers might be listed as 1.1.1.1 or 8.8.8.8, or some other similar secure host).

Also, isolate the network connection as you troubleshoot by turning off Wifi when using ether, and vice versa. Also, make sure your Mac isn't reaching out to your PHONE'S hotspot when using WIFI

Might be helpful to eliminate DNA as a culprit. Using a device that works, retrieving the actual IP address for a site that's failing, then use the IP in the borked browser's address bar. Here, I just pinged the URL in MacOS Terminal.

View attachment 2361959

View attachment 2361961

This wouldn't support a course of action, per se, but DNS is ordinarily a crucial link between remembering MacRumors exists, and viewing a page. (I know, I know... My ping time is pathetic. Out in horse country, we're lucky to get tMobile 5G extended)

More brainstorming, here; I really got nothing more without some test results. Even with results, I'm kinda stupid.

• Is it possible that your phone is sync'ing certain web site settings that aren't compatible with desktop versions of sites? Non-issue without an iPhone
• Could the issue be compounded by Hand-Off?? Again, non-issue without an iPhone.
• Was the Mini procured used from an enterprise managed environment (where it got an enterprise management agent that might prevent a truly clean reinstall (I deploy this sort of security/monitoring software routinely in my line of work).
• I'd be curious to see what a Virtual Machine would do, like if you just happen to have a Windows ARM VM in vmWare Fusion or in Parallels.

Thanks for your brainstorming. I'm trying to isolate the cause but I can't seem to find any. An apple supervisor told me today.

I can try a virtual machine just for the sake of it and tell you what happened. It would definetly be fun.

The Mini was brand new, and never used on anything related to a company, It was also checked by the Apple Supervisor that was trying to find the culprit of this weird situation.

 

[sparkhill]

Check your cables. It sounds weird, but somebody once reported an issue with an HDMI cable causing interference with Ethernet.

 

[noquelidaniel]

Check your cables. It sounds weird, but somebody once reported an issue with an HDMI cable causing interference with Ethernet.

Dude... if that's the issue I'll go full mental, seriously, hahaha. It doesn't sound weird at all. The Mac is placed on inside a cabinet with 2 HDMI, power cables. It's not impossible to be the issue. I'll just wake up better and try on a different placement.

Actually, when it was working fine, it was on a desk. It is totally possible.

Edit:

It wasn't it. BUT. the speed is way better far from the cables. However, the connectivity issues seem to persist.

 

[netflixobama]

Dude... if that's the issue I'll go full mental, seriously, hahaha. It doesn't sound weird at all. The Mac is placed on inside a cabinet with 2 HDMI, power cables. It's not impossible to be the issue. I'll just wake up better and try on a different placement.

Actually, when it was working fine, it was on a desk. It is totally possible.

Edit:

It wasn't it. BUT. the speed is way better far from the cables. However, the connectivity issues seem to persist.

Once I had a faulty HDMI cable for my Apple TV interfering with the Apple TV remote. My brain understands it's extremely unlikely, but a new HDMI cable fixed it, so I know in my heart it's true.

 

[noquelidaniel]

So, just to close this topic.

The problem was.... Sonoma. The OS. I installed Ventura 13.6.6 and it is working like a charm.

 

[Thirio2]

This happened to me so many times I gave up and switched to Wi-Fi On my m2 mini and the latest os.

 

[noquelidaniel]

This happened to me so many times I gave up and switched to Wi-Fi On my m2 mini and the latest os.

I would use Wi-FI but the problem persisted on it, so I didn't have this choice