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RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network

Maestro64
Aspirant

RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network

Here is the situation.

 

I have a ReadyNAS 102 version 6.10.2 connected to a Netgear 16 port Gbit switch which is then connected to my Netgear WNR3500 wireless Router which provided the assigned IP either via Mac Address or DHCP. The NAS will no longer automatically acquire an IP address even though the NAS is set to use DHCP to get the IP assigned from the router.

 

Originally I had the router configured to assign the IP to each piece of equipment hardwired to the Gbit Switch via the router. The NAS and other hardwire equipment always had the same IP address assigned on my internal network. Only Wireless devices got their IP assign via the DHCP server on the router.

 

Recently I ran into an issue which caused me to hard reset the router and it deleted all my address reservations which assign IP addresses based on MAC addresses. I did this so I could remotely access certain equipment on my network and port forwarding. The NAS does not run 24/4 only 16 hours a day. Because of the router being hard reset and before the NAS turned on one of the wireless devices acquired the same IP address (192.168.1.10) the NAS has always been using which caused an IP conflict. I figure out which device was using the NAS's IP address and forced it to acquire a new one. However, at this point the NAS still would not connect and I could not figure out why the NAS kept trying to acquire the old IP address even though the router was assigning all new IP addresses via DHCP.

 

After some trouble shooting I got the NAS to connect, only when the NAS was connected directly to the router bypassing the Gbit Switch all together. For a time being it keep using the original IP it always had, eventually I got it assigned a new IP from the DHCP server on the router. However, If the NAS is not direct connect to the router it will not show up on the network. Using all the same cables as connected to router, and then reconnecting to the switch the network lights on the ENET port only blinks a couple of time and stop and will not connect to the network. When connected to router the network light blink like normal and continue to blink so the network adapter in the NAS is fine.

 

I know this is long, however, I can not seem to figure out why the NAS is now refusing to connect to the network when the GBit switch in between NAS and the router. Everything else will connect through the switch and I changed cables on the NAS and tried in all the different ports with the same result. For some reason the NAS no longer likes the switch.

 

Any insight anyone can offer on how to fix this.

Model: RN102|ReadyNAS 100 Series 2- Bay
Message 1 of 11
StephenB
Guru

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network


@Maestro64 wrote:

However, If the NAS is not direct connect to the router it will not show up on the network. Using all the same cables as connected to router, and then reconnecting to the switch the network lights on the ENET port only blinks a couple of time and stop and will not connect to the network. When connected to router the network light blink like normal and continue to blink so the network adapter in the NAS is fine.

The next troubleshooting steps are to 

(a) try switching the NAS to a different switch port

(b) try connecting router to the the switch using a different switch port.

(c) try using different ethernet cabling.

 

Are the other devices on the switch behaving normally?  What model switch are you using?

Message 2 of 11
Maestro64
Aspirant

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network


@StephenB wrote:

The next troubleshooting steps are to 

(a) try switching the NAS to a different switch port - Already tried same result 

(b) try connecting router to the the switch using a different switch port. - Already tried, same result 

(c) try using different ethernet cabling. - Already tried, same result

 

Are the other devices on the switch behaving normally? - Yes all other devices are working fine once I cleared the IP conflict issue since all devices are not using the routers DHCP service to get their IP, no MAC address reseversation.

What model switch are you using? - I will have to look later, however, I am 99% certaint this is not the issue at this point since it works for everything else I plugged into it.


At one point I was thinking the ENET port on the NAS went bad, until I plugged NAS into the router and it used the originally MAC address reservation IP (192.168.1.10) and showed up on the network, it keep reusing this IP address and I knew this would be problematic since the rounter is only using DHCP and the NAS turns on and off each day. I finally the NAS will put a new IP address when it turns on when directly to the router but when the switch is between the router and NAS the it fails to acquire an IP address and self assigns.

Message 3 of 11
Sandshark
Sensei

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network

Did you also set a static IP in the NAS?  If so, it may now be conflicting with another device since it's not reserved.

Message 4 of 11
Maestro64
Aspirant

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network


@Sandshark wrote:

Did you also set a static IP in the NAS?  If so, it may now be conflicting with another device since it's not reserved.


The NAS IP is set to DHCP, along with all the hardwire devices, I used the router to set the IP address. I ran into the IP conflict issue in the past when I set each hardware device to a static IP and the decieve was not connect or turned on at the time when other devices connected. The router was originally set to have all MAC address reservation set between xxx.xxx.1.2 and xxx.xxx.1.99 and the DHCP server was set to xxx.xxx.1.100 to xxx.xxx.1.255. This originally ensured the DHCP address never crossed over to the static IP addresses.

Message 5 of 11
StephenB
Guru

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network


@Maestro64 wrote:

What model switch are you using? - I will have to look later, however, I am 99% certain this is not the issue at this point since it works for everything else I plugged into it.

I get that, but the NAS does work correctly when directly connected to the router.  So the router is part of the puzzle.

 

One more thing you could try - after DHCP fails, remove the ethernet cable to the ReadyNAS and reinsert it.  Then see if DHCP is successful.

 

Another option (if practical) is to just leave the NAS connected to a router LAN port.

Message 6 of 11
Sandshark
Sensei

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network

Once your NAS is connected directly via the router, can you reserve an address for it and then move it to the switch?  As a temporary measure, try setting the NAS to a staic IP with that address, too.

 

I do have two damaged DuoV2's that work fine with some switches/routers and not others.  In particular, they don't work right with "green" switches.  I bought them for parts, and they appear to have been damaged by a (probably lightning induced) power surge.   One does not communicate at all on some devices, the other only does so at 10 meg.  The one that works not at all on green switches works up to 100M on some "full powered" devices, and the one that can get 10M on green switches works flawlessly on some.

 

There are some things about your situation that sound a bit different than this, but I wanted to add it just as another thought trail.

Message 7 of 11
Maestro64
Aspirant

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network


@StephenB wrote:

@Maestro64 wrote:

What model switch are you using? - I will have to look later, however, I am 99% certain this is not the issue at this point since it works for everything else I plugged into it.

I get that, but the NAS does work correctly when directly connected to the router.  So the router is part of the puzzle.

 

One more thing you could try - after DHCP fails, remove the ethernet cable to the ReadyNAS and reinsert it.  Then see if DHCP is successful. - Yeap tried that did not work, however, this gives me an idea to try, which is to use the cable from router to switch and plug into the NAS and have it acquire the IP, then reconnect the NAS to the switch and then the router back to the switch. This is not a permanent solution due the NAS shutting down and retarting each day.

 

Another option (if practical) is to just leave the NAS connected to a router LAN port. - Currently my router is also my wifi access so it centrally located in the house and the switch and NAS is my network/equipment room in the basement. The router's 4 ports are in use, one of which goes to the switch. I am considering a smaller Gbit switch off the router for the office where the router  is but until I understand why the NAS will acquire the IP through the switch it does not make sense.


 

Message 8 of 11
Maestro64
Aspirant

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network

 wrote:

@Maestro64 wrote:

What model switch are you using? - I will have to look later, however, I am 99% certain this is not the issue at this point since it works for everything else I plugged into it.

I get that, but the NAS does work correctly when directly connected to the router.  So the router is part of the puzzle.

 

One more thing you could try - after DHCP fails, remove the ethernet cable to the ReadyNAS and reinsert it.  Then see if DHCP is successful. - Yeap tried that did not work, however, this gives me an idea to try, which is to use the cable from router to switch and plug into the NAS and have it acquire the IP, then reconnect the NAS to the switch and then the router back to the switch. This is not a permanent solution due the NAS shutting down and retarting each day.

 

Another option (if practical) is to just leave the NAS connected to a router LAN port. - Currently my router is also my wifi access so it centrally located in the house and the switch and NAS is my network/equipment room in the basement. The router's 4 ports are in use, one of which goes to the switch. I am considering a smaller Gbit switch off the router for the office where the router  is but until I understand why the NAS will acquire the IP through the switch it does not make sense.

Message 9 of 11
StephenB
Guru

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network


@Maestro64 wrote:
am considering a smaller Gbit switch off the router for the office where the router is but until I understand why the NAS will acquire the IP through the switch it does not make sense.

I think you meant "won't acquire".  It might not be possible to figure it out, especially if you are using an unmanaged switch.

 

Another simple test to try - disconnect everything on the switch except the NAS and the router, and see if that behaves normally or not.  If that works, try adding back one device at a time, and see if you can isolate the failure to a particular device.

 

If you want (or need) to take a deeper dive: 

 

The protocol used looks like this:

  1. A broadcast message is sent by the NAS (DHCPDISCOVER), which the switch should be forwarding to all it's active ports.
  2. All DHCP servers that receive that message will then allocate an IP address and send that address to the NAS via a second broadcast message ( DHCPOFFER ). 
  3. The client then sends a third broadcast message (DHCPREQUEST).  This accepts one of the offers.  Since it's broadcast the other servers automatically withdraw their own offers when they see this response.
  4. The DHCP server whose offer was accepted sends a fourth broadcast message to acknowledge (DHCPACK)
  5. The NAS should then probe the IP address it receives (with the ARP protocol) to check for a duplicate address.

Since all the DHCP messages are broadcast, you could try to take a wireshark trace from a PC connected to the switch - and see if you can look at this message traffic.  You might also try downloading the log zip file, and look at the various logs when the ethernet interface on the NAS is activated.  There might be some error messages in there that could give you some clues.

 

The protocol will clearly fail if the broadcast messages aren't reliably forwarded by the switch. There likely will be some timeout error in the NAS log if that is happening on steps 1-4.  The "green" switch issue @Sandshark points out could be a factor (and it could be affecting the router's switch port - not the NAS).  So that would be one reason why the packets aren't being forwarded or are generating link errors in the switch, but it isn't obvious why this would suddenly start happening.

 

If you still have some duplicate addresses on the network, step 5 might be failing.  That should be logged.

 

It will also misbehave if you somehow have two DHCP servers on the network - if the one that isn't in the router responds first, then you could end up with a bogus address.  An outright failure of the protocol should result in a self-assigned address (169.254.0.1 through 169.254.255.254) - but if you did have two servers, you'd probably see a normal completion with an IP address that might not be compatible with your network (or which might be a duplicate).

 

Yet another misbehavior occurs if the NAS doesn't realize it needs to send the DHCPDISCOVER in the first place.  For instance, if the NAS is connected to a switch, but you disconnect/reconnect the router's switch port.  The NAS sees no lost connection, so it has no reason to request a new address.  However, if you are booting the NAS, or disconnecting/reconnecting its ethernet cable, it should be sending out the DHCPDISCOVER.

 

Message 10 of 11
Sandshark
Sensei

Re: RN102 will not Acquire and IP and Connect to Network

Rather than the switching back and forth of cables, I suggest you try setting a static IP in the NAS and either make sure it is outside the range your router will assign or also reserve it in the router.  I don't generally recommend static IP's, but that could go a long way in detemining if the assignment of an IP is really your only problem   I rather think it's not..  If I'm wrong and that does completely fix the situation, then go with it.

Message 11 of 11
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