Occasional Wi-Fi connection issues

At first I figured it was just AT&T being AT&T, but turns out that's not it. Basically, my Wi-Fi signal just drops out entirely—everything I have open in Chrome freezes up, and then after a minute or two, things crawl back to life. And by "freeze," I mean the whole system hangs; I can't even close a tab because the page isn't responding. It’s completely random—happens maybe 20 times a day, no pattern at all, regardless of whether I'm heavy downloading or just idling with a few tabs open. I actually called AT&T yesterday to complain; they did their thing and said everything looked fine on their end, but then last night, the exact same thing happened again. I finally realized it isn't an ISP issue—whenever my laptop hits this freeze and loses the signal, my phone stays perfectly connected and works without a hitch.
Anyone have any leads on what could be causing this? Thanks.🙂

Either you've got some garbage drivers, or the chip inside your laptop is just being unstable...

Try reinstalling the drivers or even a clean OS install—just to see if the issue sticks around. If you can, grab the latest versions from the manufacturer's site.

If it turns out to be the chip itself, a decent workaround is just picking up a USB Wi-Fi adapter. You can find those tiny ones that don't stick out too much, though personally, I prefer the ones with an antenna since the reception is usually better.

Look, it could also be the router. It might be acting up specifically with your computer because a PC is way more demanding than a phone.

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@Eric Peterson17/">@@Eric Peterson17

Ever thought about trying a different browser besides Chrome?

@Andrew Peterson2/">@@Andrew Peterson2, thanks for the input. I'm becoming more convinced this is a hardware issue—I'm using one of those cheap white routers they warned me about regarding vertical signal range. I'm upstairs and the thing is stuck on the ground floor.

@ironcyclist58/">@@ironcyclist58, tried that through Mozilla right when the connection dropped, but still nothing.

The router has an antenna that both receives and transmits signal. If you keep it vertical, it’s mostly sending energy out sideways rather than up or down. By laying it flat, you actually redirect that radiation pattern vertically, aiming it toward the ceiling and floor instead.
But honestly, that’s probably not even your biggest headache. You’ve got way too many walls in the way and way too much interference from everyone else's Wi-Fi in the neighborhood. Your best bet is probably just running a long Ethernet cable up to the next floor. If you really need wireless coverage there, you can just hook up an Access Point to that cable—even an old router sitting in a drawer can be repurposed as an AP if you tweak the settings.
Another way to tackle this would be picking up some Powerline adapters that have both LAN and Wi-Fi ports built-in.

I don't think the walls are actually the issue here—it's definitely not like you just got a router yesterday that's struggling through drywall...
You should probably just call AT&T and tell them this happens all the time with the Wi-Fi, then demand they swap out the hardware. They gave me a new one without any hassle. For a while, they were pushing these cheap black routers—the technician actually told me they were bottom-of-the-barrel and caused nothing but headaches—but eventually, he swapped it for a decent unit and now everything runs smooth, just like it used to.

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Apologies for the radio silence. Long story short—called AT&T again the other day because my router was still acting up intermittently even after a full reset. They wouldn't budge on a replacement until we tried one more thing: switching the channel. Whatever that means. Since they did it, things have been smooth for two days straight. Appreciate the help.

@G/Duki, quick question regarding your post. I own some rental units—one sits directly above the other, physically detached from the main house—so I need to get them online. My plan is to just run a single router, but now I'm stuck on placement. Should it go in the upper unit or the lower one? Does the signal tend to travel better downward or upward? Honestly, I'm lost here—I asked the folks at AT&T the same thing, and predictably, they gave me conflicting advice. One tech said the bottom unit, the other insisted on the top.