Mysterious WIFI router problem.

[stardust3]

No mention of the non working channel.

Personally I would not let the router auto pick a channel.

1, 6 & 11 are the only non-overlapping channels. Also set the frequency to 20 mhz only instead of mixed 20/40.

 

[Tampa8]

That's what I'm afraid of. I guess if I just give the router the proper name and PW it should repopulate all the connections, right? I don't have any other custom stuff such as IP assignments as my stuff is automatically assigned. Only wifi are two printers and the iphones and ipads. Everything else is hardwired ethernet

I changed my reply after doing research ...

 

[harshness]

Doing some research I do see you said you have had it for ten months and have never updated.

Wrong model. The 1900AC firmware was last updated in June 2015 as I noted in post #6.

 

[harshness]

Going further down the road without at least a factory reset doesn't look like it is going to bear any fruit.

 

[Hall]

Wrong model. The 1900AC firmware was last updated in June 2015 as I noted in post #6.

That router, the WRT1900AC, still appears to be actively sold (Amazon, Newegg, Walmart, etc) yet Linksys hasn't updated the f/w in 18 months. Pretty sad on their part.

 

[TheForce]

There is a check for firmware update in the access screen and it said I have the latest firmware, nothing to update.

Going further down the road without at least a factory reset doesn't look like it is going to bear any fruit.

So you believe that a factory reset won't help. I may give it a try next week anyway. If it fails, I can still run an ethernet cable to my printer that does not work at 5Ghz. Nearest switch is about 18 ft away in my Home theater. Then I will only have one device left that is stuck on 2.4Ghz. That is my bathroom scales and it is rather buggy anyway. I was a beta tester for it. It has trouble staying connected on it's own. So with that one I first have to verify the router is awake on 2.4Ghz, and then reconnect the scales so it can upload my weight and BMI data to the cloud server. The company is aware of that issue and hasn't figured out how to fix it in 6 months.

I've always had trouble with wifi here. For years the routers just didn't have good coverage around the house and I've experimented with repeaters with marginal success. Then I tried a Net Gear and that one didn't last 6 months before it just quit altogether. This one is the first router that has great coverage, but just started acting up on 2.4 recently.

 

[harshness]

There is a check for firmware update in the access screen and it said I have the latest firmware, nothing to update.

Do the date or name of the update look like June 2015?

So you believe that a factory reset won't help.

I believe, as I stated, that anything short of a factory reset is a waste of time.

You also have third-party firmware options on that router (ddwrt and tomato).

 

[harshness]

Pretty sad on their part.

Be that as it may, that's what I found when I used the model number that Don provided.

The fact that the S model came out so quickly suggests that Linksys went another direction.

 

[stardust3]

You also have third-party firmware options on that router (ddwrt and tomato).

Both are great options, the factory firmware on most routers are garbage imo. ddwrt or tomato in combination with Ubiquity products like their Unifi or airmax products would give a person 1 heck of a reliable network with no dead spots.

 

[EarDemon]

That router, the WRT1900AC, still appears to be actively sold (Amazon, Newegg, Walmart, etc) yet Linksys hasn't updated the f/w in 18 months. Pretty sad on their part.

And that's exactly why I'm buying more business class products. I've had my Cisco RV320 router and Cisco WAP371 wireless access point for two years now with no complaints. Granted, these aren't high end enterprise grade devices, but they are decent with the right amount of features. The router was released in the Spring of '13 and the WAP in the Summer of '14. The router so far has had 9 firmware updates with the most recent being from 2 weeks ago and the WAP has had 7 firmware updates, the most recent being the end of September of 2016. The only way I would touch a consumer level router is if it could be flashed to run the third party firmware mentioned above. The manufactures are generally terrible about updating this stuff, since the product will be EOL within 18-24 months after it being released. Planned obsolescence and the next big thing and all. Businesses won't put up the that crap, and neither will I.

 

[Hall]

Both are great options, the factory firmware on most routers are garbage imo. ddwrt or tomato in combination with Ubiquity products like their Unifi or airmax products would give a person 1 heck of a reliable network with no dead spots.

How does a firmware change the coverage pattern ? Some 3rd party f/w don't even allow increasing the power anymore.

 

[navychop]

Both are great options, the factory firmware on most routers are garbage imo. ddwrt or tomato in combination with Ubiquity products like their Unifi or airmax products would give a person 1 heck of a reliable network with no dead spots.

TKS. Looking at ubiquiti products now.

 

[stardust3]

How does a firmware change the coverage pattern ? Some 3rd party f/w don't even allow increasing the power anymore.

DDwrt allows for power control. This particular setup I have rather low.

It's best imo to use a router with 3rd party firmware to handle traffic only and have a separate wifi like a ubiquity pico station or similar.

This screen shot is from my outdoor wifi. It's a ubiquity bullet m2 titanium. It is fully adjustable also and outputs 600 mW of power.

Edit: At 26 dBm it's 398 mW, at 28 dBm which is max would be 630 mW.

For out of the box plug and play with ddrwrt with great wifi the nighthawk is a good 1 but expensive.

https://www.flashrouters.com/routers/router-types/dd-wrt/netgear-r7800-ddwrt-router

Edit again: It appears the dBm output on the 2.4 ghz side of the router Don has is 19 dBm which is 79 mW.

 

[harshness]

And that's exactly why I'm buying more business class products. I've had my Cisco RV320 router and Cisco WAP371 wireless access point for two years now with no complaints.

While Cisco is well known and charges business class prices and more for their products, they also lead the industry in router bugs. The last CERT advisory had no less than a dozen security issues in IOS and that's really sad for something that people put such trust in.

 

[TheForce]

Not my field of expertise as some of you, but my thinking is that any product that has frequent firmware updates is a product that doesn't work right when brought to market. Not what I want here. This is not a hobby for me. I don't want to center my life around having to monkey with this. For me it is an appliance and needs to work as claimed all the time. If there is a firmware update, I would welcome it if it was done to add new features.

Plus, I don't need coverage down the block, just everywhere in my house and on the patio next to the house outside. The current one does now, when it is working right.


Since this problem surfaced just a couple months ago, I will attempt to do the factory reset this week and then if that doesn't fix the problem, I will run an ethernet cable to my printer and take it off the wifi. That leaves the Qardio bathroom scales as the only remaining 2.4Ghz wifi device left. For that I only need it once a week and will just do a refresh on the PW to get it working for a day or two. Everything else will be on 5Ghz which works fine. When that fails, I guess it's time to buy whatever new is on the market. Hoping these things last more than a year.

Old fart speaking- When I worked as an engineer, I was expected to make stuff that would work as claimed for at least 10-20 years. Today, engineers are expected to make stuff fail just beyond the warranty period.

 

[Hall]

but my thinking is that any product that has frequent firmware updates is a product that doesn't work right when brought to market. Not what I want here. This is not a hobby for me.

Do you use the original software that your iPhone shipped with ?

 

[harshness]

Old fart speaking- When I worked as an engineer, I was expected to make stuff that would work as claimed for at least 10-20 years. Today, engineers are expected to make stuff fail just beyond the warranty period.

You're likely talking about designs that typically didn't include encryption and significant software reconfigurability. Many modern routers run on some sort of Linux base. Linux isn't entirely bulletproof and with its flexibility comes some element of risk. Modern routers are computers, not some sort of glorified Strowger switch.

Routers often include public domain code by reference and when something is found that is wrong with that code (i.e. Heartbleed), a conscientious manufacturer will update the firmware. Other times there is mean-spirited software that attacks a particular brand of router (i.e. TheMoon with Linksys routers). When these are discovered, there should be at least one firmware update to update the product so it isn't open to attack. Occasionally it is necessary to disable certain technologies as just too messed up to fix (i.e. WEP, SSLv3).

How many iOS releases appear to have "broken" routers only to discover that a subsequent release restores interoperability? iOS 8 was particularly messed up in this respect with a nasty DHCP bug. This is not your father's Oldsmobile.

 

[EarDemon]

While it can be troublesome, I’d rather have a manufacture provide years of updates, versus own an orphaned device within a year after purchase. There is sometimes when an update is just needed because you can’t foresee the future. My router in particular had occasional issues with WAN speeds at over 100 Mbps when it was first released. While I’m sure in a testing lab somewhere Cisco had internet connections much faster than 100 Mbps 4 or 5 years ago, the average end user did not have that speed. There’s only so much in-house testing you can do. When more people started getting these faster connections, and problems were reported, they fixed the problem. My router also has 3G/4G USB failover. How is a manufacture supposed to guarantee functionality of a cellular USB modem that will be released in 6 months, on a 4 year old router? There are compatibility issues between certain makes and models of routers and security appliances when it comes to site to site VPN tunnels, that can be addressed with firmware updates.

Or what about this. So at the beginning of 2011, I purchased a high end Sony 3DTV, blu ray player and ES series A/V Receiver. All internet enabled with all of the smart features. A few years ago Google made backend changes to the way YouTube operates rendering the YouTube app on my three devices useless. I haven’t had an update to any of them in years for anything.

This is an ever evolving industry, with millions of different combinations of hardware. Firmware updates are needed, and needed often.

 

[TheForce]

You're likely talking about designs that typically didn't include encryption and significant software reconfigurability. Many modern routers run on some sort of Linux base. Linux isn't entirely bulletproof and with its flexibility comes some element of risk. Modern routers are computers, not some sort of glorified Strowger switch.


Routers often include public domain code by reference and when something is found that is wrong with that code (i.e. Heartbleed), a conscientious manufacturer will update the firmware. Other times there is mean-spirited software that attacks a particular brand of router (i.e. TheMoon with Linksys routers). When these are discovered, there should be at least one firmware update to update the product so it isn't open to attack. Occasionally it is necessary to disable certain technologies as just too messed up to fix (i.e. WEP, SSLv3).

How many iOS releases appear to have "broken" routers only to discover that a subsequent release restores interoperability? iOS 8 was particularly messed up in this respect with a nasty DHCP bug. This is not your father's Oldsmobile.

Sorry, but engineers aren't hired to make excuses for their incompetence. And, I don't expect you to apologize for them. They just need to make the damn stuff work as claimed or find an engineer who can.

Not saying it needs to work in tomorrow's environment, just work to the specifications it lays claim to today. And, if an engineer decides to rely on cheap software or a bargain basement chip or components that overheat and fail, then it was he that screwed up.

 

[harshness]

Sorry, but engineers aren't hired to make excuses for their incompetence. And, I don't expect you to apologize for them. They just need to make the damn stuff work as claimed or find an engineer who can.

Unfortunately, the blame often gets placed on the wrong product. If iOS breaks something but it works with an Apple-branded router, it must be the non-Apple router that is bad, right? Apple has proven a certain ability to produce bad code and chasing after every bad possibility isn't easy in a network environment. Not an excuse but a reality.

Then we have you that seems to be completely averse to taking the next step of doing a factory reset. While engineers can hard code a checksum for the firmware, it is a lot harder to checksum the configuration.