Led changes from white to orange - ac1750 r6700v3

[lfayb]

I  have had my nighthawk ac1750 r6700v3 for  less than a week and still learning about it.

If I plug my  destop and my laptop into ethernet ports  both led lights show white and if I run speed tests on each, I get the 200 Mbps speed I am paying my internet company for.
If I then plug in my printer to an ethernet port -the LED light is orange, which I figure is a limitation to the printer.  But the light for the laptop turns orange also and the speed drops on it, the desktop is not affcted. 
Is this normal?   If you connect more than 2 devices does only one device stay at the highter speed. or do I have a problem?

[antinode · Accepted solution]

> OK, I do not understand at all. [...]

   Perhaps some gizmo was confused, and got straightened out after
enough restarts.  Watchful waiting until the next time it acts up?

[myersw]

Welcome to the wonderful world of Netgear firmware.

No the speeds of Ethernet ports should not be effected by another port being activated. There have been other Ethernet port issues reported some seem to be hardware and some seem to be firmware. 

You did not report the version of firmware so assuming you have the latest. If so you may want to fail back to an earlier version as netgear has been putting out crap firmware lately IMHO. 

If you install an older version of the firmware I would suggest you do a reset on the router and a new configuration. 

[lfayb]

Thanks for the reply.  Yes, I checked to see if there was a firmward update and I have the most recent version.

II decided to try soething that seemed to work thought I have not idea why.
I had my destop in port 1,  my printer in port 3 and my laptop in port 4.
With the printer off  both port 1 and port 4  showed white.
With the print on, port 1 was **bleep**e port  3 was ortange and if the laptop was on it turned from white to orange, port 1 remained white.
I siwtched porte 3 and port 4 -  port 3 the laoptop, port 5 the printer.   Port 1 and prot 3 both on and white.   Plugged in pritner it was orange both both port 1 and port 3 stayed white.  It  "appears"  that haivng the slower device in port 3 affect the faster device in port 4.  I know soemthies are not as they seem, but that is the way it appears.  WIll have to monitor a while and see what happens, I guess.
I have reported another issues along with someoneelse about the Guest Led light always being on, evnthought there is not guest net work set up.
Just trying to learn about this new router

Thanks for your reply.

[antinode]

> [...] r6700v3

   Firmware version?

> [...] my destop and my laptop [...]

> [...] my printer [...]

   What are all these devices?

   I'll assume that you've read the R6700v3 User Manual, and understand
what those port-status LED indicators (are supposed to) mean.

> If I then plug in my printer to an ethernet port -the LED light is
> orange, which I figure is a limitation to the printer.

   If we all knew the maker and model of your "my printer", then more
than one of us could do the research to learn how fast its Ethernet port
should be.  100MHz is typical for a printer, because that's typically
faster than the print mechanism.

> [...] But the light for the laptop turns orange also and the speed
> drops on it, the desktop is not affcted. [...]

   Again, some information on these devices might be helpful.  It's
common for an Ethernet interface in a computer to drop its speed from
1000MHz to 100MHz when it is in some kind of stand-by or sleep mode.

> [...] Is this normal? [...]

   Depending on exactly what "this" is, it might be.

> [...] If you connect more than 2 devices does only one device stay at
> the highter speed. [...]

   No.

> [...] I checked to see if there was a firmward update and I have the
> most recent version. [...]

   As always, an actual version number would be more useful than your
opinion of what's "most recent" today.

> [...] I have reported another issues along with someoneelse about the
> Guest Led light always being on, evnthought there is not guest net work
> set up.

   Bad Netgear firmware is a fact of life, but, before I got too
excited, I'd look at what the operating system on your "my destop" or
your "my laptop" says about the speed of its Ethernet interface when
these LED colors change.  Again, detailed instructions would be easier
if anyone else knew what these devices were.

[lfayb]

The desktop is an hp desktop and the laptop is an Acer both running windows 10 home.
The ethernet adapter on each shows they support 1G. The desktop does not have a wifi adapter. the laptop does. The ethernet network card on the laptop is a Realtek PCIe GBE family controller.
The printer is a canon pixma series mx920 WS.

When doing these tests I made sure the laptop was attaching to the ethernet connection not the wifi connection.

As far as I know. the orange means it is connected at 10/100 and the white means 1G.

I just changed my plan with my ISP from 100Mbps to 200Mbps. But with my old router still the most I could get on a speed test was 100Mbps download I found out its ports were only 10/100. So I bought a new router that said it had 1G ethernet. I know I will will not get 1G, but when the white light is on the router i get about 200Mbps download on speed tests on both my laptop and my desktop which is what I expected with my plan.
The laptop light stays white until I plug in the printer, the printer light comes on orange to start. with which I expected. Just a few seconds later the latop light turns orange. This was when I had the laptop plugged into port 4 and the printer to port 3
If I check the ethernet connection on laptop when light is white shows 1G, if I check after it turns orange it shows 100.

I thought switching the ports of the printer and laptop solved the problem, but it did not. Just did another test. The desktop light just turned orange again, it did not change to orange immediately like it did before, took a few mintues. I just checked the connections speed and it is showing 10 not even 100. The desktop is still showing 1G and is still white.
I went to laptop and did the speed test and it showed 9.5 MBps.  I do not know if it had "gone to sleep"
I turned off the printer, then disconnected laptop from ethernet then reconnected to ethernet. THe light  is white. The internet connections shows a status of 1G. The speed test shows 237 Mbps. I will just leave it set for awhle without doing anything on it and see if the light turns orange.  THe printer is plugged it but turned off.

The firmware on my router is: V1.0.3.66_10.0.50

Hope this is all the information needed.

All the ethernet cables are cat 5e.

Thanks

[lfayb]

OK, I do not understand at all.
The laoptop is set to not goto sleep or turn off display if it is plugged in and it pluged in.

I have had the laptop ethernet port light go from white to amber more than once.
But this time when I tested it did not happen. I switched ports again and it still did not happen.
It definitely happened before, but does not seem to be happening now. I have no clue. But can not seem to reproduce the probelm at this time, so do not know what cuased it or when if ever it may happen again.    😞

[antinode]

> The printer is a canon pixma series mx920 WS.

   Ok.  As expected:

      https://www.usa.canon.com/internet/portal/us/home/support/details/printers/inkjet-multifunction/mx-s...

      Wired LAN: 100BASE-TX/10BASE-T

That explains _its_ amber port-status LED.

> As far as I know. the orange means it is connected at 10/100 and the
> white means 1G.

   That's what the User Manual says.

> [...] Just a few seconds later the latop light turns orange. [...]

   I see no good reason for that change.  The LAN port speeds should
be negotiated independently.  If each port can be persuaded to run at
1000MHz under some circumstances, then my suspicions would lean toward
the firmware rather than the hardware.

> The firmware on my router is: V1.0.3.66_10.0.50

   I'd try something different/older.  It might not help, and might have
other problems of its own, but it'd be a reasonable experiment.

   Another interesting experiment would be to connect your devices to a
separate (cheap) gigabit Ethernet switch.  If they don't bother each
other when connected to a known-good switch, then you can be (more)
confident that the problem lies with the router, rather than with any of
your devices.

   If you still have any free support left, I'd contact Netgear, and
complain.  If not, but you still have remaining warranty, then you could
ask for a replacement.  Otherwise, a $15 switch might make a good
work-around while pondering what to get as your next router.

[antinode · Accepted solution]

> OK, I do not understand at all. [...]

   Perhaps some gizmo was confused, and got straightened out after
enough restarts.  Watchful waiting until the next time it acts up?

[lfayb]

Yeah,  I guess that is what I will do.  Wait and see if it happens again, and if so , see if I can determine what exactly might have done it.
Thanks for trying to help

[michaelkenward]

---

@lfayb wrote:

The laoptop is set to not goto sleep or turn off display if it is plugged in and it pluged in.

How about the Windows setting for Power Management on the LAN?

Who knows what Microsoft has changed on your PC in its never ending updates?

[lfayb]

I just now found this post.  Went and looked at the setting, and it was checked.  Unchecked it Since it was not consistent in when the problem occurred  not sure when I will know if it fixed it or not.  But will give it a try and see.  With my old router was not aware when /if the issue occurrred becuase it did not have the indicator lights.
THANKS