Rapid DHCP: Or, how do Macs get on the network so fast?

Anecdotally, my mac is absolutely horrible at connecting to my wifi. I often have to try multiple times and some times I give up, have to walk over to the router and restart it before I can get on. Probably an issue with the router ultimately, but I don't have this problem with other devices.

The only time Ive ever had issues with OS X connecting to wifi was while using a cheapo router that insisted on advertising its 2.4GHz and 5GHz networks using the same SSID.

Moving to a router that allowed them to be configured with different SSIDs resolved all my issues.