Posted in | Posted on 12-29-2009 | 3,957 views
After switching providers yesterday, I noticed that my net access was mysteriously dying every 4-5 hours. I hit up the status page on my router and see that everything looks fine. I can do a DHCP Release/Renew and immediately get a good response, but I still can't do anything on the Internet. Unplugging the router fixes it every time. Is it a bad router? If so - it seems like a bit of a coincidence that it died the same day I switched providers. However - I'd be less likely to blame the hardware if a simple restart didn't fix it each and every time. The router in question is a Linksys BEFSR41. The firmware hasn't bee updated since 2004, which is probably around when I picked up the device. I'm tempted to just swing by Office Depot and pick up a new Linksys model. If it works again for 5 years I'd consider that a fine investment for 40-50 bucks.
p.s. And may I say for the 100th time how much I hate dealing with hardware and networking?
My broadband provider is Charter Communications.
Also - I have found some routers to get EXTRA flaky when I have certain apps running. Torrents and other P2P software that blast huge quantities of very small packets through your router can make it fall over sooner. I have a WRT54G that died daily under load, but that is great now that I switched to Tomato firmware.
If you do go the route of buying a new device, I definitely second the recommendation for Tomato or DD-WRT. Check and make sure any device you buy is compatible with one or both. You don't have to install new firmware right away, but at least you have the option. My experience with Tomato is great and it does ALOT more than the default firmware. Some firmware also offers several VPN endpoint configurations. Tomato specifically (in my experience) is worth looking into and really not that hard at all to install on the device.
http://www.polarcloud.com/tomato
http://www.dd-wrt.com
There are also others, but those are two of the most popular in my experience.
@SM: I use my MBP at night mostly. I use a Mac desktop during the day. I've observed the "death of connectivity" issue in both areas, with similar results both times.
1) switching to wireless N @5GHz helps because there are no interfering devices such as wireless home phone and bluetooth on that diapason
2) new Apple Airport Extreme works much more stable than Netgear with 3 internet hungry laptops connected at the same time. Looks like price of the device tells about it's stability under higher loads.
Might be useful, might not so don't get too distracted :)
Ditto that. Just because I use a computer to do work, everyone thinks I know how to:
• get a 10 year old pc on FiOS through a wireless router
• set up or fix every $10 piece of crap mp3 player available in CV.
I would recommend the DD-WRT firmware as well as a replacement of the stock one. Works a lot better, has a lot more features, and for me, seems to be a lot more stable. I used to have to reboot my router every day or it would get slower and slower and eventually lock up. Updating the firmware fixed that in a sinch :)
I also tried Tomato, and actually installed it on the same router model at a friend's place. Excellent as well, AJAX interface, and a little easier to install because its installation file was smaller (the particular router has an initial limit set by its BIOS if I remember correctly, and I had to install DD-WRT in a two-step process - but this might have changed by now).
Having seen and worked with both, I prefer DD-WRT but that's just a personal choice. You can not go wrong with either of them. And as for wireless (you mention that your walls on the second level block the signal), one of the nice things about both of these interfaces is that you can adjust the strength of the signal to anything you want, bypassing the default set by most routers, making the signal strong enough to go through bomb shelters. I just make sure to turn the wireless off when the baby is home. :o)
I used to use the Linksys routers/firewalls but I switched to Watchguard and never looked back:
http://www.watchguard.com/products/edge-e/overview...
They even make a "non-wireless" version.
I read some comments but not all so if someone said this already I'm sorry. Have you tried logging into the router and doing a system reset? You know setting the manufacture defaults back to normal, and then see if that works?
Let me give folks an update. The mysterious, and somewhat regular, network death hasn't happened. Or - if it has, maybe I missed it. I was playing Warcraft late last night and lost connectivity for 1 minute, but never had to reset the router, it just came back by itself.
I'm just going to stand back today and see whats what. (Although I may still go buy a router since I've got next to no hardware write offs for 09.)
My comment won't be popular, but I've had nothing but bad luck from Linksys. On my last one, I flashed it to WRT-DDT, but I wouldn't recommend doing this unless you really want to tinker with your settings. I have good luck with Netgear & DLink (although I use an Airport Extreme now).
http://www.google.com/products?q=F5D8235-4
Here's a link to the PDF guide:
http://en-us-support.belkin.com/app/answers/detail...
I've used DD-WRT in the past with an older Linksys router and thought it was superior. I unintentionally bricked it the first time I installed the firmware and had to open the case and cross some wires to reset it. Other than that, it worked well.
thats what i'm running and it's awsome
So here is the odd thing. Before I switched, I did a Speakeasy test. I saw DL speeds of 40mbs or so, uploads of 10 or so.
Now I see downloads between 10-20, uploads of 5. WTF. I thought maybe it was the VPN software, but I've turned off any VPN support. Anything else I should check or should I just return it?
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