A clerk’s tablet shows “connected” to the municipal SSID with a strong signal but never receives an IP address; the SSID is mapped to the wrong VLAN without DHCP. From a technician troubleshooting view, what is the best classification?
Select an answer to reveal the explanation.
Short Explanation
Associated with great bars but no IP? Layer 2 hugged you; the VLAN/DHCP config ghosted you. That is network configuration, not “Wi-Fi needs −90 dBm to do DHCP.”
Full Explanation
Users often call any failure “no connectivity,” but technicians separate successful 802.11 association from IP reachability. When association works yet DHCP fails because the SSID is on a wrong VLAN or scope, the fault is a configuration error in the wired/SSID mapping—not RF path loss or a driver crash indicated only by strong RSSI.