Every time I turn on one of my Win7 64 bit pc's my router goes down

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leh18621

[H]ard|Gawd
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Jun 18, 2008
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I had a topic on this a few months ago. I thought I finally had it working when I switched from DD-WRT to Tomato. It worked perfectly for the last three months until Friday night. The only settings I changed on the router was set up security, everything else is default.

I have two 64 bit pc's (one runs Win7 Home Premium, the other is Vista Ultimate). One is connected to the router via ethernet cable, the other connects with a wireless nic. As long as both pc's are turned off everything is fine (can browse the interent with no problems on the other two pc's we have, both Win7 32bit). As soon as I turn on either of the 64 bit pc's it takes the router down and none of the pc's can browse the internet. As soon as I turn of the 64bit pc, the 32bit pc's are fine again and resume internet browsing. Just for a test, I plugged one of the 64bit pc's directly into the cable modem and was able to browse the internet fine so it's not the interenet connection or cable modem, but the router.

My router is the WRT54GL. I noticed today a new firmware version for Tomato came out in June so I upgraded the router hoping it would help, but it didn't.

Anybody have any ideas? It's clearly a problem with the 64 bit version of Windows working with Tomato on the WRT54GL and I am really stumped right now.
 
I haven't had a problem running IP 6 on DD or Tomato...but try unbinding (disabling) IP6. I've read, but never experienced, that some older model routers w/older firmware lock up when IP6 is present on the system. My sons gaming rig is Win7 x64...and now and then I've run on just an old wrt with both DD and Tomato and it's run fine.
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
I haven't had a problem running IP 6 on DD or Tomato...but try unbinding (disabling) IP6. I've read, but never experienced, that some older model routers w/older firmware lock up when IP6 is present on the system. My sons gaming rig is Win7 x64...and now and then I've run on just an old wrt with both DD and Tomato and it's run fine.
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I already disabled IP 6 right after I installed Windows of those two computers. I have already disabled Homegroups also.
 
Are the x64 systems connecting wirelessly, or via cable? If via cable, what make/model NIC?
 
I am heading out to work at the moment, but of the two x64 pc's, one connects wirelessly, the other connects via ethernet cable. The one that connect with a cable is the pc in my sig, it uses a p5q Pro Turbo motherboard.
 
That's the same motherboard I used in my sons gaming rig...
Latest drivers installed for it?

Do you have UPnP enabled on the wrt's?

On the Win7 rigs...TCP/IP is set to "obtain auto"..right? (guessing it is since you plugged into the modem and ran)

Try a netsh /reset?
 
1. Compare the MAC hardware address of your machines and router and make sure they are all unique.

2. Ensure that your router's IP address is outside of the scope of your DHCP range.

3. Forget DHCP and try assigning static IP addresses to all of your machines.

Other than that, it's a toughie. Could be a bad NIC flooding the router with bad traffic but you say that both of your 64bit machines cause this behavior, making me lean towards the options above instead.
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
That's the same motherboard I used in my sons gaming rig...
Latest drivers installed for it?

Do you have UPnP enabled on the wrt's?

On the Win7 rigs...TCP/IP is set to "obtain auto"..right? (guessing it is since you plugged into the modem and ran)

Try a netsh /reset?
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I am using the lastest Windows drivers for my nic, however, I am pretty sure there are newer drivers on the Asus website which I can update tonight when I get home. All of the pc's get their IP addresses through DHCP via the router, except for the hard wired pc which I statically set (I took out the IP address when I plugged directly into the cable modem of course).

I believe I have UPnP enabled on router, NAT as well.

I am not familiar with netsh/reset, or not sure what you mean. I know I have my router scheduled to reset itself every day at 3am.
 
Orinthical said:
1. Compare the MAC hardware address of your machines and router and make sure they are all unique.

2. Ensure that your router's IP address is outside of the scope of your DHCP range.

3. Forget DHCP and try assigning static IP addresses to all of your machines.

Other than that, it's a toughie. Could be a bad NIC flooding the router with bad traffic but you say that both of your 64bit machines cause this behavior, making me lean towards the options above instead.
Click to expand...

I can hard set all devices to static IP addresses for the sake of testing. Hopefully I can do that tonight. My routers IP address is 192.168.1.1, I have the DHCP range set up to be 192.168.1.100 to 150.

Another thing to note, the pc that is running Vista 64 bit that I connect with wirelessly. I have also tried to connect it to the router directly with an ethernet cable and it takes down the router regardless of whether I connect wirelessly or cabled.

Furthmore, the Vista 64 bit pc that I was just talking about. I took another hard drive and loaded Vista 32 bit for this pc. If I run Vista 32 bit on the pc it doesn't take down the router. As soon as I put the hard drive back in that has Vista 64 bit on it, it immediately takes down the router. Therefore, it's not the pc, it's the version of windows (32bit vs 64bit) that is taking down the router or a setting on the router that doesn't work well with 64 bit OS's.
 
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Now that I am home I did the following:

1. Found updated drivers for my nic on the Win7 64 bit pc and updated them.
2. Disabled DHCP on the router and gave all devices static IP addresses.

So far I have been up and running with the Win7 64 bit pc turned on and every pc is browsing the internet fine. I am going to keep the Vista 64 bit pc off for a few days to see how it goes. It's only been 20 minutes of up time so it is too early to tell, but at least it's not like it was this weekend where as soon as I turned on the Win7 64 bit pc it took the router down in a matter of seconds.
 
Well, we had no problems with internet for almost exactly 24 hours. A little while ago all pc's began to not be able to display web pages. As soon as I turned off my Win7 64 bit pc, all other pc's and devices started being able to browse the internet again.

I guess it's back to the drawing board. Anybody have any other ideas?
 
I just went through every screen in tomato and turned off every option for logging anything. Then I cleared cooking in the router and selected shutdown. It's lightning fast now even with the Win7 64bit pc on........but for how long is the question.

I really wonder if it is some setting in tomato that if I adjusted it the router would rarely ever go down. Problem is, I am not that knowledgeable on all the settings. I have read through a wiki page on all the settings, the problem is I don't understand what some of the mean (or do) as I am not a professional networking person.
 
I suppose I'd start with resetting the router to defaults....and then redo your wireless security, web admin password, enable UPnP..and leave it at that for a while.

I know Win7 x64 works fine with DD and Tomater....as I've run them fine, on a wrt54g version..oh...3 I think, and on a wrt54gl, and on a wrt150n
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
I suppose I'd start with resetting the router to defaults....and then redo your wireless security, web admin password, enable UPnP..and leave it at that for a while.

I know Win7 x64 works fine with DD and Tomater....as I've run them fine, on a wrt54g version..oh...3 I think, and on a wrt54gl, and on a wrt150n
Click to expand...

I already tried resetting the router to defaults and upgrading the firmware on Friday night, then reset it to defaults again on Sunday and just set up the basics, but that's not working.
 
Well, I was browsing pretty quickly for.....7 minutes. Just had to turn off the Win7 64bit pc again.
 
I left my pc Win7 64 bit pc off for an hour, and we were able to use the internet fine on the other pc's and got me to thinking: is it simply the fact of turning on the 64 bit pc's that takes down the router, or the fact that I am using the internet on the 64 bit pc's that is crashing the router?

I turned my 64 bit pc back on a little over an hour ago and the only thing I did was start up my Folding, but I didn't open up any internet browsers, and just walked away to let it Fold. Interestingly, the router hasn't crashed at all with the 64 bit pc turned on and connected to the router while Folding.

That would seem to tell me that only when I am browsing the internet on the 64 bit pc does it take down the router, and it has nothing to do with the pc turned on. Normally if my 64 bit pc is turned on and I am at home I am on the internet on it. I never tried turning the pc on and walking away to see what happens like I did tonight.
 
Are you normally running a bitorrent client on the PC in question? I've seen bitorrent be the final nail that kills some older routers.
 
I had a similar problem once when I was running the windows 7 beta. Somehow windows was trying to act like a router or a bridge or some crap like that and it was bringing down the network. Never did find a cause or resolution so I went back to XP. Once retail hit I installed 7 again and had no problems. It was a frustrating problem to say the least lol.
 
Have you scanned the machine for malware? Try running MalwareBytes, you may could have some sort of browser malware crap on it.
 
CaseyBlackburn said:
Have you scanned the machine for malware? Try running MalwareBytes, you may could have some sort of browser malware crap on it.
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I have run scans numerous times and found nothing. I have formatted both pc's in the past (on more than once occasion) and as soon as I started browsing the internet it took the router down even with the pc's just having a clean install.
 
jpochedl said:
Are you normally running a bitorrent client on the PC in question? I've seen bitorrent be the final nail that kills some older routers.
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No, never have. The only "thing" I have run on the Win7 64 bit pc is Vonage (which we did away with last month), and now Magic Jack.

There has to be something about the 64 bit versions of Windows that is confusing the hell out of the router. Ironically, both of our Win7 32 bit pc's can browse the internet indefinitely without us having a problem. Our 360, ps3 and Wii don't give us any problems either. It's only the 64 bit pc's that give us problems.

The two 64 bit pc's are the only ones with pc games installed on them. That shouldn't cause any problems should it? I am just trying to think what is different and could be the problem.
 
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I run almost exclusively 64bit Windows 7 / Server 2008 in my home with the only exceptions (right now) being a Linux laptop and a Windows 7 Home Basic (32Bit) Netbook. I wouldn't blame the OS edition - but I have to admit your issue is puzzling.

I know you doled out static IP addresses but did you ever compare MAC addresses?

To get the MAC address on a windows system, go to the command prompt (start, run, cmd) and type 'ipconfig /all' - look for the 'Hardware Address' field. Make sure these are unique on all of your machines and your router.
 
Orinthical said:
I run almost exclusively 64bit Windows 7 / Server 2008 in my home with the only exceptions (right now) being a Linux laptop and a Windows 7 Home Basic (32Bit) Netbook. I wouldn't blame the OS edition - but I have to admit your issue is puzzling.

I know you doled out static IP addresses but did you ever compare MAC addresses?

To get the MAC address on a windows system, go to the command prompt (start, run, cmd) and type 'ipconfig /all' - look for the 'Hardware Address' field. Make sure these are unique on all of your machines and your router.
Click to expand...

I have only compared MAC addresses when looking at the list of connected devices to the router in tomato. I always assumed that was accurate. If you don't think tomato is accurate with it's MAC address's listed I can go to each individual pc.

Two other things have come to mind worth mentioning. This problem isn't new with this router. I also have a Netgear WNR3500 and Linksys WRT160N that when I used them had the exact same problem: using a Windows 64 bit pc would crash them. I did use one router that worked great. From mid 2007 until March 2009 I had some cheap $29 Netgear router (I don't remember the model number of it) that I never had a problem with anything, it worked with no problems at all with my Vista 64 bit pc (I didn't have my Win 7 64 bit pc at that time of course). It wasn't until that router died and I bought these three routers that the problem started. I bought the WRT160N in March 2009 and had so much down time with it that I bought the WNR3500. A month later I was beyond fed up with it so I bought the WRT54GL. Got fed up with the stock firmware and started trying DD-WRT and tomato and that is where I am at today. If my $29 Netgear router had never died I would not have this problem today.

The other thing I had completely forgot to mention is that my previous work laptop that I used up until April of this year (an HP laptop that had Win7 64 bit on it, I would try to connect both wirelessly and hard wired) would single handedly crash my router as well if I tried to use it at home. So that makes three computers with Windows 64 bit OS's on them that have consistently taken down the router.
 
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leh18621 said:
I have only compared MAC addresses when looking at the list of connected devices to the router in tomato. I always assumed that was accurate. If you don't think tomato is accurate with it's MAC address's listed I can go to each individual pc.
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I am thinking that the MAC address of your x64 machine may be the same as the router or that the router may have 'learned' its MAC address at some point or another and that is why whenever you turn that specific machine on, everything dies at varying lengths of time. So yes, manually confirming is better and should only take a few minutes.

MAC addresses must be unique on a network or 'odd things' can happen ranging from hiccups to all-out collapse.

Other than that the only other thing I can suggest is to try another network card in the x64 box, something perhaps a bit more robust than onboard such as an intel 1000CT/PT. It could simply be a bad card. You should also try a new patch cable where applicable.
 
Orinthical said:
I am thinking that the MAC address of your x64 machine may be the same as the router or that the router may have 'learned' its MAC address at some point or another and that is why whenever you turn that specific machine on, everything dies at varying lengths of time. So yes, manually confirming is better and should only take a few minutes.

MAC addresses must be unique on a network or 'odd things' can happen ranging from hiccups to all-out collapse.

Other than that the only other thing I can suggest is to try another network card in the x64 box, something perhaps a bit more robust than onboard such as an intel 1000CT/PT. It could simply be a bad card. You should also try a new patch cable where applicable.
Click to expand...

I have manually confirmed the MAC address of our four pc's and router: none had a duplicate IP address.

I will check at work to see if they have any recent network cards that I can borrow to test with. However, I doubt the five network cards total within the three 64 bit pc's that I have used at home over the last six months have all been bad (the Win 7 64 bit tower has one ethernet nic, the work HP win7 64 bit laptop I used both wired and wireless cards, and the Vista 64 bit tower pc I have used both wired and wireless cards........and all have taken down the router).

I have replaced the patch cable twice this year so far with new ones just for the sake of ruling that out as the problem.

Any other advice would be appreciated. Maybe this is God's way of telling me I need to purchase a new, better router. I just don't know.
 
Keep in mind that this problem started March 2009 when my $29 Netgear router died and I bougt the WRT160n Linksys router. I was using the Vista 64bit pc at the time. After a month of trying to resolve this problem I decided to buy the Netgear WNR3500. The problem continued. After another month I decided to buy the WRT54GL and I replaced the patch cable. The problem continued.

At that point last summer I was wondering if my Vista 64 bit pc was the problem. I litterally put it in the corner, don't use it any more, and built the Windows 7 pc (in my sig) along with new patch cables. The problem continue. Since then I have tried various firmware releases of DD-WRT and tomato, but the problem has continued.

So, since this problem started I have replaced the router three times, the patch cords three times, and built an entirely new pc and retired the previous Vista 64 bit pc. I have replaced the firmware on the WRT54GL with two different types and various revisions of firmware.

I have literaly replaced every piece involved over the last 15 months, but the problem continues.
 
Could be the software you're installing on the PCs and allowing to run at startup.
 
Danny Bui said:
Could be the software you're installing on the PCs and allowing to run at startup.
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Anything is possible. My 64 bit pc's have always been my gaming pc's and used for Folding. However, even my previous work laptop that had Win 7 64 bit I mentioned in an earlier post crashed my router and that pc doesn't have any of the same software as my gaming pc other than Office 2007.
 
leh18621 said:
I have manually confirmed the MAC address of our four pc's and router: none had a duplicate IP address.
Click to expand...
IP or MAC address? Note that I meant the MAC(physical address) on each machine from ipconfig /all, not the IP address. :)

Next step: Priest and holy water...
 
Orinthical said:
IP or MAC address? Note that I meant the MAC(physical address) on each machine from ipconfig /all, not the IP address. :)

Next step: Priest and holy water...
Click to expand...

Sorry, I miss typed that. I mean all pc's have different MAC address's.
 
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