Get Detailed WiFi Info From the Menu Bar
You can retrieve extended wireless connectivity data from anywhere within Mac OS X by holding down the Option key and then clicking on the WiFi menu icon.
Option-clicking will display a sub menu under your active wifi connection that shows what wireless band you are using (PHY Mode), the routers SSID (BSSID), what channel the wireless router is using, which encryption method (Security), signal strength (RSSI), the transmit rate, and MCS index (whatever that is).
You can also mouse-over other SSID’s to see a slightly more condensed version of this information. All of this can be helpful for avoiding potential channel conflicts, or when troubleshooting wireless problems.
And yes, I called it the WiFi menu rather than AirPort, since Lion is moving away from the AirPort references, at least in regard to the menubar.
This will be really useful.
Thank you!
In Lion there’s a new “Wi-Fi Diagnostics” in that menu. Pretty interesting.
Do you have a screenshot of that? I don’t see it.
There is a good explanation of the MCS index value in the midst of this article:
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/11/05/06/mac_os_x_10_7_lion_to_support_450_mbps_wifi_on_2011_thunderbolt_macbook_pro_imacs.html
Looks like this works also for the Bluetooth and Sound menus.
[...] ones and that is about it. Now click on the menubar icon with the Option key pressed. Our thanks to OS X Daily for that [...]
Just checked on Snow Leopard, works on loads of the menus, time machine, audio, bluetooth, sound, battery wifi etc
[...] via OSX Daily [...]
this doesn’t seem to work with my computer. no response from holding down the option key (running tiger 10.4.11)
[...] from finding currently available networks, and you won’t recover historical data from the menu bar item or otherwise excellent OS X wi-fi scanner tool. We’ll cover two simple ways to find this [...]