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Nighthawk AC1900 C7000 intermittently Drops WiFi, inaccessible via LAN port
Used with COX internet - firmware: (i'll updated this later but confirmed with Netgear that it is the latest update from Cox)
Gateway broadcasts SSID but you can't connect to it. Inaccessible via LAN cable. If accessible, impossibly slow and times out (frown face on pages)
Problem began about the time i started hooking up smart home devices. Ecobee, light switches, Google nest hubs etc. Worked great for about a week but bagan having trouble when i hooked up a Linksys range extender. Removed range extentder and problem remained. System had anywhere from 20-27 devices hooked up via DHCP.
Finally gave up and RMA'd the device. Hooked up the new one and had the exact same problem. Determined that there was an offending device on my home network wreaking havoc i decided to install an additional DHCP server downstream and see if that server would have problems while the Netgear box stayed alive.
Right now the Netgear box has only 1 client via DHCP and my 5 year old Buffalo DD-WRT router is handling all the ip requests in the house. (there are three access points in the house, same as with the Netgear setup). I was hoping that the network downstream of the Buffalo device would die so I could slowly trace the problem to a specific access point, but nothing has happened at all. It's running great. The problem is that I miss the much stronger radio of the Netgear router.
it appears to me that the Netgear router simply dies if you give it more than ~20 clients? This seems unlikely, but the system functions fine until you start hooking them up to the access points (which each have 5 or so devices, TV, light switches etc.)
Again, the system is running fine as a modem. 300 Mbps down, 30 up very reliably. But if this is the case i wish i would have just bought a more reliable Motorola modem.
Nothing useful showed up in the logs.
Any ideas?
4 Replies
What happens if you turn OFF ALL other wireless APs and just run with the modems wifi only?
Do any of your IoT devices broadcast there own wifi signal besides the modem and your other wifi APs?
How is your DHCP service IP address pool configured? 192.168.0.2 thru .254? If so, try this, Set the pool to 192.168.0.100 thru .200.
For those devices that you can set a Static IP address ON, set a static IP address ON these devcies to out side of the new pool size. Not inside. Items like APs, printers, cameras, NAS, controllers, etc, anything that you can configure it's networking settings and doesn't need any router mangement, set a static IP address on the device.IF you have other WiFi APs running in concert with the modems wifi, this maybe an issue as well and it maybe causing some interferences. Separate channels should be used, so on the modems 2.4Ghz radio, set channel 11, AP#1, set for channel 6 thats farthest away from the modem. AP#2 set for channel 1 thats closest to the modem. I would not run the 3rd AP#3. Or you can run AP#3 can maybe disable the WiFi on the modem.
Distance in important as well between the modem and APs. 30 feet is a good start to begin with. Any thing close would be too much over lap in the signals.
Good comments - I tried a vesion of this last night and the internet was up for about 3 hours before it did it's thing and siezed up. As usual, fast speeds, no problem for streaming movies etc.
There are a total of 27 devices on the network and I reserved IPs for all of them and limited the DHCP range as suggested. Anything in the house that can have a static ip already does, but there isn't much. stereos, game consoles, TV - probably a total of 6 or 7 items. The APs do NOT offer that option which really bugs me (Actiontec WB3000N).
I had all 2.4 GHz radios off as well yesterday during this time.
One thing to note, is that when this problem started i had all radios on the access points turned off, they were just being used for ethernet to old non-wifi stereo equipment, so it was only the Netgear gateway and a EL cheapo EX2700 extender across the house. The problem really began when i replaced the EX2700 with a Linksys RE580 that i had laying around. I thought that maybe the RE580 was causing problems so i got rid of it but that didn't alleviate things. I only turned on the wifi on the access points after bypassing the Netgear gateway because the radio on my buffalo router is pretty dated. during this time we added a lot of smart stuff - google hubs, ecobee, switches etc. (a lot of changes at the same time - hard to isolate).
It has to be something with one of these $18 wifi switches from Amazon that clashes with the Netgear firmware, but seems to have no problem with the other equipment, who knows. This thing should be able to handle 30+ DHCP leases no problem. and yes - everything that can grab a 5GHz signal is on the 5G line (so it's not 30 leases on a single line).
My next thought was to only put the switches on the Netgear router (total of 8) and leave everything else on the Buffalo router and see what happens, maybe it's not a quantity thing but a lone offender. Then I can slowly start pulling more things on until it breaks again. Kind of a pain though.
I'm sure there are people here who have way more than 30 devices on their gateways.
FYI - general system is
C7000 (Modem / DHCP server) -> Actiontec Moca adapter (ECB6200K02) back fed back into home and picked up at Moca adapters (WCB3000N) -> switch in a few locations around the house for ehternet access (those are the access points). I've had this setup with no issues for a long time.
Now it is C7000 (Modem only) -> Buffalo (DHCP server) -> Actiontec -> Other Actiontec (with wifi turned on)..... and it's working with no issues.
Glad you found the configuration that works for you.
Please mark your thread as solved so others will know.
Enjoy. :smileywink:
