What is going on with my network...

M

maxiedaniels

Gawd
Joined
May 25, 2005
Messages
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My home network is going *nuts* suddenly.

The setup is an Actiontec FIOS router, wired to a few computers, a Netgear switch, and then across the house there's a Airport Extreme in bridged mode.

The internet will suddenly die out of nowhere. Sometimes restarting the router/airport works, but it's not consistent. The only clue I'm seeing is that my laptop is showing a message on it that says my laptop's network name is in use, "Blablabla's Laptop (3)"... as if the network is not renewing the clients on the network and is trying to double or triple them. I even noticed if I go to Airport Utility, my network, instead of being called "Family Network", it's called "Family Network (3)"... that's when the system isn't working though - once I get it working, the names are back to what they should be.

What is going on here? It's my parents place, they said they had the Verizon guy come and replace the router and then I replaced the old switch with a new switch.... it fixed things for a week or two but now it's doing it again.
 
When the internet is "down" see if you can ping the router.
If so, access the router web interface and see if it still has an IP on the WAN/Internet interface.

All devices lose internet connectivity?
 
All devices seem to lose internet connectivity or are very slow.

Pinging the router now, I'm getting times between 300 and 800 milliseconds, and timeouts every few pings...
 
Pings like that on your internal network? Is this on WiFi or Ethernet?
 
Are you sure the airport is not trying to hand out dhcp leases?
 
Wifi has 500ms pings with timeouts. Wired ethernet has .25ms pings with timeouts.

Airport is set to bridged mode.... shouldn't that mean it isn't handing out dhcp leases?
 
maxiedaniels said:
Wifi has 500ms pings with timeouts. Wired ethernet has .25ms pings with timeouts.

Airport is set to bridged mode.... shouldn't that mean it isn't handing out dhcp leases?
Click to expand...


I'm not sure how that device is set up, but you need to go into the Airport and make sure ALL DHCP is turned off. Most Wireless Routers don't tie the devices DHCP to the wireless, i.e. switching the operating mode on the wireless doesn't affect the devices DHCP server one bit.
 
Right, but the Airport Utility has two different DHCP mentions. Router mode is set to bridged (no dhcp). But the Internet tab says 'connect using DHCP'... other options are PPPOE and static..
 
You shouldn't be using the Internet/WAN port on the Airport, so the Internet tab should be irrelevant.

Are any of the wired devices plugged in to the Actiontec, or do the wired devices and Airport plug in to the switch, which plugs in to the router?
 
j-sta said:
You shouldn't be using the Internet/WAN port on the Airport, so the Internet tab should be irrelevant.

Are any of the wired devices plugged in to the Actiontec, or do the wired devices and Airport plug in to the switch, which plugs in to the router?
Click to expand...

The Internet/WAN port on the Airport is how it gets internet...

Yes, wired devices are plugged into the Actiontec. Actiontec wireless is disabled.

Actiontec wired ports (and the netgear switch connected to it) are wired to ethernet ports all around the house. Plugged into those ports are multiple computers, along with an Airport extreme, which is set to bridge mode. The Airport gets its internet connection from being plugged into the wall, so I don't see how the Internet/WAN port is irrelevant, unless I'm misunderstanding something.... (which, is entirely possibly as the system is going crazy)
 
maxiedaniels said:
The Internet/WAN port on the Airport is how it gets internet...

Yes, wired devices are plugged into the Actiontec. Actiontec wireless is disabled.

Actiontec wired ports (and the netgear switch connected to it) are wired to ethernet ports all around the house. Plugged into those ports are multiple computers, along with an Airport extreme, which is set to bridge mode. The Airport gets its internet connection from being plugged into the wall, so I don't see how the Internet/WAN port is irrelevant, unless I'm misunderstanding something.... (which, is entirely possibly as the system is going crazy)
Click to expand...

Ok, so that may be part of the problem.
Normally when running a 2nd router, even "bridged," you wouldn't use the WAN port because the primary router's DHCP requests won't go through the 2nd router for the clients connected to the 2nd router. If that makes sense.
Now, granted, I don't know a whole lot about Airports and maybe its bridged mode does allow that pass-through and also prevents a double-NAT on the clients connected to the Airport.

Although that certainly would not explain clients connected to the switch or directly to the Actiontec to lose internet.

Now, if you're getting ping timeouts to the Actiontec, from the clients connected directly to it, that sounds more like an issue with the Actiontec.

When the internet goes out, what does the WAN/Internet status on the Actiontec say? Does it still show a valid external IP?
 
The next time the problem happens, disconnect the Airport. If the problem stays, it isn't likely the problem device. Replace the switch as a test. An about to fail power adapter can cause a switch to suffer degraded performance. Try putting the Actiontec on a different AC circuit. It could be as simple as someone running an electrically noisy appliance on that circuit.

Don't assume the problem has to be internal. I had a similar issue with my network. Occasional crap response, sometimes loss of internet. Of course, it worked perfectly whenever the tech showed up. He would look at all the logs I had of the crap response and say that since it was working now, nothing he could do. It got fixed when after spending an entire day trying to connect a nearby neighbor's house, they replaced a main board in an upstream device. Have had trouble free internet since.
 
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