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Devices are assigned strange IP addresses and fail to connect to wifi
Hi,
Occasionally, iPhones and iPads in my wifi network start getting strange IP addresses in the range 169.255.x.x or 169.254.x.x and fail to connect to wifi. These IP addresses belong to South Africa...
I found out the the issue was caused by my wired mesh speakers (connected to the Satellite). Once I disconnected those speakers (connected wirelessly now), all issues disappeared.
Do you have any wired Sonos connected to Orbi?
sportruby wrote:
Thanks for responding so quickly! In fact I do have a Sonos system that is partially hardwired - although they ultimately lead back to the router as opposed to the Satellite they are closer to. In order to operate the configuration I in this particular room (Playbar + ConnectAmp powering rears + Sub), the system needs to be in Boost, which requires that the Playbar and ConnectAmp are hardwired either through the router or directly together. I'm going to remove them from the router and hardwire them together instead, and see if that stops the random IP issues.
For Sonos to work properly, you need to either:
1. Wire ONE and only ONE Sonos device to your LAN.
OR
2. Wire NO Sonos devices and connect them all via your WIFI by entering your SSID/Password in the Sonos controller app.
I use approach #1 and it works perfectly with Orbi.
If you connect more than one Sonos device to your LAN, or plug one Sonos device into another, you create a network loop. That's most likely the source of your issues.
I'm curious, why are you wiring two Sonos devices "together" and what do you mean by that exactly?
I have many Sonos speakers around my home. In one room, I have a 5.1 surround system setup utilizing the Playbar as the center and front speakers, and a ConnectAmp powering the rears, plus a Sonos Sub. In order to operate in this configuration, that "Room" needs be configured in Boost mode. Here's the link on that setup:
https://support.sonos.com/s/article/2237?language=en_US
Note #1 in the Setup instructions:
- Wire both the Sonos home theater speaker and Connect:Amp to either your router, a single network switch, or to each other, using an Ethernet cable.
sportruby wrote:
I have many Sonos speakers around my home. In one room, I have a 5.1 surround system setup utilizing the Playbar as the center and front speakers, and a ConnectAmp powering the rears, plus a Sonos Sub. In order to operate in this configuration, that "Room" needs be configured in Boost mode. Here's the link on that setup:
https://support.sonos.com/s/article/2237?language=en_US
Note #1 in the Setup instructions:
- Wire both the Sonos home theater speaker and Connect:Amp to either your router, a single network switch, or to each other, using an Ethernet cable.
This is exactly the setup I had which cused all my Orbi issues. Please try first disconnecting all Sonos to confirm the theory. After that you can try having only one speaker wired which is the minimum to have a Sonesnet connectivity.
sportruby wrote:
I have many Sonos speakers around my home. In one room, I have a 5.1 surround system setup utilizing the Playbar as the center and front speakers, and a ConnectAmp powering the rears, plus a Sonos Sub. In order to operate in this configuration, that "Room" needs be configured in Boost mode. Here's the link on that setup:
https://support.sonos.com/s/article/2237?language=en_US
Note #1 in the Setup instructions:
- Wire both the Sonos home theater speaker and Connect:Amp to either your router, a single network switch, or to each other, using an Ethernet cable.
Thanks. I also have many speakers, including a Playbar, a Sub and a 5.1 surround setup. I'm not using a Connect:Amp though.
Only one Sonos device is wired--the Playbar.
For my surround setup, I'm using a pair of Play3s. The Playbar and the Play3s have a dedicated 5 GHz radio for wireless surround sound. This radio does interfere a little with Orbi's backhaul, reducing throughput, but not enough to matter.
The Connect:Amp is older and I believe it doesn't have the 5 GHz radio. Thus the instructions to wire the Connect:Amp. Wiring is required because Sonos supports only 2.4 GHz WiFi, and 2.4 GHz WiFI has too much latency to support surround mode.
If you go WiFi only, then you won't be able to have surround sound.
To get this to work properly with Orbi, I expect you will need to manually disable the WiFi radio in the Connect:Amp. That will remove the network loop. See this link or Google it.
https://bsteiner.info/articles/disabling-sonos-wifi
P.S. Note that you can't only have one room in boost mode. Either your entire system is in boost mode, or your entire system is using WIFi. As soon as you wire any one of your Sonos devices, the entire system switches to boost mode and no longer uses your WiFi.
Almost a month uptime without the need to restart my system. I'm now happy with the performance of Orbi. Great coverage, stable wifi and good usuable features.
There are still minor issues that I'm sure Netgear will tackle in the coming releases.