NeRD Q

[Nrrrrvous]

Cannot stress enough how much better wired is for gaming and even Zooming. Mrs. Nrrrrvous started teaching from the living room on her Mac this fall and complained about dropping/lagging. I tried different channels, 5 vs 2.4 etc. Finally ran a Cat6 from the router to her "spot". Now we have no problems. Happy wife, happy life.

Of course, part of that was, all of a sudden, I had myself working from home with a VPN, three teens all zooming their classes/watching videos/playing games and Mrs. Nrrrrvous teaching. I think we are getting our money's worth!

[johnb]

I thought English was the preferred language on this board. Please stick to it. I might report you to a Mod . . . oh, wait . . .

Most of the words do seem to be English so that the sentences almost make sense. Perhaps it’s some sort of code or maybe a regional dialect or maybe they’re from a parallel Star Trek planet. Whichever, it kinda creeps me out.

[johnb]

I thought English was the preferred language on this board. Please stick to it. I might report you to a Mod . . . oh, wait . . .

Most of the words seem to be English so that the sentences almost make sense. Perhaps they’re speaking in some sort of code or regional dialect or maybe the posters have been mysteriously transported from a parallel Star Trek planet. Whichever, this thread kinda creeps me out.

[LasVegas]

Just curious. Have they solved the iphone/ipad switching issues that they used to have with mesh networks? (1-2 years ago?) I tried a nice Eero package about a year and a half ago. My iphones would connect to one of the APs but then would have trouble switching to a different AP when you carried them to the other end of the house. After much research into the Eero and Orbi systems I was told that it was an Apple issue and they couldn't do anything about it. I gave up and went away from mesh wifi. Anyone still having these issues?

I have zero issues with my iPhone in my home. I actually have 2 iPhones, 3 iPads, and a MacBook Pro. No issues at all moving about.

[Nrrrrvous]

I have zero issues with my iPhone in my home. I actually have 2 iPhones, 3 iPads, and a MacBook Pro. No issues at all moving about.

That's good to hear. I never tried the TP Link. Or maybe Apple has solved the problem. I switched over to a Luxul system that has been pretty solid.

[ClemmonsDevil]

This topic deceived me into thinking a new BBQ restaurant opened by scientists had opened and I was super excited. You're all monsters. May God have mercy on your souls.

[-jk]

That makes sense - as shown in the attachment I just added, my router on channel 6 is spanning a wide range (2-10?) of frequencies. I'm just wondering if it wouldn't be better to be the only AP on channel 8 or 9 vs. being one of several nearby APs on channel 6...

Each channel in the 2.4 GHz range overlaps with the two adjacent channels on either side. Using 1, 6, and 11 keeps them all separated: 1 overlaps with 2 and 3; 6 with 4,5,7,and 8; 11 with 9 and 10.

When multiple APs are on the same channel, the protocol has them negotiate to share use of the channel as efficiently as practical. When they're on different but overlapping channels they just interfere with each other, causing failures and retransmissions (and reduced effective throughput) - the loudest one wins. That might be yours and your neighbor might suffer. Or vice versa. For the sake of the all of us, keep them on 1, 6, and 11.

There's really very little effective bandwidth in the 2.4 GHz range. Yes, you can use channel 9 (for instance), and it may work great for you. But your neighbor might have stutters in movies or their Zoom sessions freeze. Play nice!

Channels in the 5 GHz range don't overlap and don't penetrate as far, and thus don't cause/have the same interference issues. Any traffic you can move to to 5 GHz helps everyone. The only problem is that penetration thing. You can cover a lot of home with a single 2.4 GHz AP, but it takes multiple APs to do the same with 5 GHz.

All that said, if you're in a suburban house with no close neighbors, it's really just about what happens inside your house - where you have your own APs interfere with each other and not bother anyone else.

-jk

[elvis14]

Great thread. Thanks for those who have supplied useful input (especially jk). Here is my situation. I have a 3000 sqft house 2 stories. The cable modem and router are on the first floor in a coat closet (top shelf). The modem is pretty new from Spectrum. I had some issues recently and they came out and gave me all new hardware. I run speedtest all the time and I'm getting 100-200 mb/s download and about 10 mb/s upload. I use Zoom everyday (since March) to dial into meetings without issue and my youngest daughter is taking online classes upstairs and she's not seeing issues either. I'm using a corp MacBook Pro and she's using a ChromeBook (best bang for the buck computer I've every bought by far).

Here's the ironic thing for me. Whoever built my house prewired it with Cat 5. I've been here 10 years and I've never used it. There's a patch panel in the coat closet but I've never figured it out (just haven't need to solve a problem that I haven't had). As a software engineer, I won't claim I'm great with HW but I fully admit it's pretty bad that I've never even tried to figure out the wired connections. For example, I don't think it'd be that hard to figure out the 1 wire that runs from the room I'm currently working in to the patch panel and plug the other end into the router.

I was using the My Spectrum app to log into my router this week. There were 27 devices logged in. One of them was my HP printer, which has stopped working. The Printer has been in use for a few years without issues. Now it comes up, logs into the Wifi (SSID "Graceland", of course), shows as connected on the router, etc. but no other device can seem to reach it. I've tried printing from 3 different machines (Windows, OSX, Chromebook) and my iphone. The printer has an ip address: 198.162.1.82, my Macbook is on the name network (meaning 198.162.1) but it won't find the printer and I can't even ping 198.162.1.82 successfully . I've rebooted everything but no luck. If anyone has advice on what to do next, I'd love to hear it. The only goofy thing is that the router is administered using MySpectrum app and it's giving me very few things to control or see. I'll take any advice on what to do next.

pressley-mac-0<253> dig -x 198.162.1.82


; <<>> DiG 9.10.6 <<>> -x 198.162.1.82
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: SERVFAIL, id: 53079
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0


;; QUESTION SECTION:
;82.1.162.198.in-addr.arpa. IN PTR


;; Query time: 1039 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.1.1#53(192.168.1.1). <---note, router's ip address
;; WHEN: Wed Oct 28 10:34:35 EDT 2020
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 43


pressley-mac-0<255> ping -c 5 198.162.1.82
PING 198.162.1.82 (198.162.1.82): 56 data bytes
Request timeout for icmp_seq 0
Request timeout for icmp_seq 1
Request timeout for icmp_seq 2
Request timeout for icmp_seq 3


--- 198.162.1.82 ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 0 packets received, 100.0% packet loss

[-jk]

Cannot stress enough how much better wired is for gaming and even Zooming. Mrs. Nrrrrvous started teaching from the living room on her Mac this fall and complained about dropping/lagging. I tried different channels, 5 vs 2.4 etc. Finally ran a Cat6 from the router to her "spot". Now we have no problems. Happy wife, happy life.

Of course, part of that was, all of a sudden, I had myself working from home with a VPN, three teens all zooming their classes/watching videos/playing games and Mrs. Nrrrrvous teaching. I think we are getting our money's worth!

Absolutely. Anything streaming video (i.e., movies and zoom) should be wired whenever possible, even if it's a 100' cable draped around the edges of the rooms and halls during the covid era. It makes a world of difference.

We rented a beach house in Duck that had a single wifi router in the far corner of a bedroom on the ground floor. And, of course, the great room, etc, was on the 2nd floor. We dropped a cable out a great room window and back in a bedroom window, and used my travel router for upstairs wifi. Worked like a charm!

-jk

[DukeBlueDevil]

Great thread. Thanks for those who have supplied useful input (especially jk). Here is my situation. I have a 3000 sqft house 2 stories. The cable modem and router are on the first floor in a coat closet (top shelf). The modem is pretty new from Spectrum. I had some issues recently and they came out and gave me all new hardware. I run speedtest all the time and I'm getting 100-200 mb/s download and about 10 mb/s upload. I use Zoom everyday (since March) to dial into meetings without issue and my youngest daughter is taking online classes upstairs and she's not seeing issues either. I'm using a corp MacBook Pro and she's using a ChromeBook (best bang for the buck computer I've every bought by far).

Here's the ironic thing for me. Whoever built my house prewired it with Cat 5. I've been here 10 years and I've never used it. There's a patch panel in the coat closet but I've never figured it out (just haven't need to solve a problem that I haven't had). As a software engineer, I won't claim I'm great with HW but I fully admit it's pretty bad that I've never even tried to figure out the wired connections. For example, I don't think it'd be that hard to figure out the 1 wire that runs from the room I'm currently working in to the patch panel and plug the other end into the router.

I was using the My Spectrum app to log into my router this week. There were 27 devices logged in. One of them was my HP printer, which has stopped working. The Printer has been in use for a few years without issues. Now it comes up, logs into the Wifi (SSID "Graceland", of course), shows as connected on the router, etc. but no other device can seem to reach it. I've tried printing from 3 different machines (Windows, OSX, Chromebook) and my iphone. The printer has an ip address: 198.162.1.82, my Macbook is on the name network (meaning 198.162.1) but it won't find the printer and I can't even ping 198.162.1.82 successfully . I've rebooted everything but no luck. If anyone has advice on what to do next, I'd love to hear it. The only goofy thing is that the router is administered using MySpectrum app and it's giving me very few things to control or see. I'll take any advice on what to do next.

pressley-mac-0<253> dig -x 198.162.1.82


; <<>> DiG 9.10.6 <<>> -x 198.162.1.82
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: SERVFAIL, id: 53079
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0


;; QUESTION SECTION:
;82.1.162.198.in-addr.arpa. IN PTR


;; Query time: 1039 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.1.1#53(192.168.1.1). <---note, router's ip address
;; WHEN: Wed Oct 28 10:34:35 EDT 2020
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 43


pressley-mac-0<255> ping -c 5 198.162.1.82
PING 198.162.1.82 (198.162.1.82): 56 data bytes
Request timeout for icmp_seq 0
Request timeout for icmp_seq 1
Request timeout for icmp_seq 2
Request timeout for icmp_seq 3


--- 198.162.1.82 ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 0 packets received, 100.0% packet loss

As an IT guy, always gotta ask first, have you tried rebooting the printer?

What are the IP settings on the printer itself? Is it DHCP or is it set with a static IP?

Generally with printers I try to use a static IP just so they don't constantly bounce around. So in the IP settings you'd set it to 192.168.1.82, the subnet mask (usually) would be 255.255.255.0, and the default gateway would be the router IP (likely either 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.1.254)

[LasVegas]

Absolutely. Anything streaming video (i.e., movies and zoom) should be wired whenever possible, even if it's a 100' cable draped around the edges of the rooms and halls during the covid era. It makes a world of difference.

We rented a beach house in Duck that had a single wifi router in the far corner of a bedroom on the ground floor. And, of course, the great room, etc, was on the 2nd floor. We dropped a cable out a great room window and back in a bedroom window, and used my travel router for upstairs wifi. Worked like a charm!

-jk

Internet at a beach house? Isn’t this illegal?

[elvis14]

As an IT guy, always gotta ask first, have you tried rebooting the printer?

What are the IP settings on the printer itself? Is it DHCP or is it set with a static IP?

Generally with printers I try to use a static IP just so they don't constantly bounce around. So in the IP settings you'd set it to 192.168.1.82, the subnet mask (usually) would be 255.255.255.0, and the default gateway would be the router IP (likely either 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.1.254)

On the printer, I've rebooted (power cycled) the printer multiple times. I've also gone through the wi-fi wizard a few times (which essentially finds my SSID and asks me to reauthenticate and reconnects). Each time it reconnects, has the same IP Address but no other device can reach it.

The printer does have an option for printing the Network Configuration:

Ip Address: 192.168.1.82
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 192.168.1.1
Configuration Source: DHCP
Primary DNS Server: 198.162.1.1

I don't see anywhere in the printers simple menu system where I can switch to a static IP (although it seems to use the same one no matter what I do).

[-jk]

Great thread. Thanks for those who have supplied useful input (especially jk). Here is my situation. I have a 3000 sqft house 2 stories. The cable modem and router are on the first floor in a coat closet (top shelf). The modem is pretty new from Spectrum. I had some issues recently and they came out and gave me all new hardware. I run speedtest all the time and I'm getting 100-200 mb/s download and about 10 mb/s upload. I use Zoom everyday (since March) to dial into meetings without issue and my youngest daughter is taking online classes upstairs and she's not seeing issues either. I'm using a corp MacBook Pro and she's using a ChromeBook (best bang for the buck computer I've every bought by far).

Here's the ironic thing for me. Whoever built my house prewired it with Cat 5. I've been here 10 years and I've never used it. There's a patch panel in the coat closet but I've never figured it out (just haven't need to solve a problem that I haven't had). As a software engineer, I won't claim I'm great with HW but I fully admit it's pretty bad that I've never even tried to figure out the wired connections. For example, I don't think it'd be that hard to figure out the 1 wire that runs from the room I'm currently working in to the patch panel and plug the other end into the router.

I was using the My Spectrum app to log into my router this week. There were 27 devices logged in. One of them was my HP printer, which has stopped working. The Printer has been in use for a few years without issues. Now it comes up, logs into the Wifi (SSID "Graceland", of course), shows as connected on the router, etc. but no other device can seem to reach it. I've tried printing from 3 different machines (Windows, OSX, Chromebook) and my iphone. The printer has an ip address: 198.162.1.82, my Macbook is on the name network (meaning 198.162.1) but it won't find the printer and I can't even ping 198.162.1.82 successfully . I've rebooted everything but no luck. If anyone has advice on what to do next, I'd love to hear it. The only goofy thing is that the router is administered using MySpectrum app and it's giving me very few things to control or see. I'll take any advice on what to do next.

pressley-mac-0<253> dig -x 198.162.1.82


; <<>> DiG 9.10.6 <<>> -x 198.162.1.82
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: SERVFAIL, id: 53079
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0


;; QUESTION SECTION:
;82.1.162.198.in-addr.arpa. IN PTR


;; Query time: 1039 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.1.1#53(192.168.1.1). <---note, router's ip address
;; WHEN: Wed Oct 28 10:34:35 EDT 2020
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 43


pressley-mac-0<255> ping -c 5 198.162.1.82
PING 198.162.1.82 (198.162.1.82): 56 data bytes
Request timeout for icmp_seq 0
Request timeout for icmp_seq 1
Request timeout for icmp_seq 2
Request timeout for icmp_seq 3


--- 198.162.1.82 ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 0 packets received, 100.0% packet loss

You're mixing your IP subnets in this message - 198.162.x.x v 192.168.x.x - I think something's amiss there.

Inside your home network everything will be 192.168.something (fairly usual), 10.something (not as likely as 192.168.something, but not too uncommon), or 172.something (fairly rare as a default setting). Well, unless you really know what you're doing, but then you'd know what you did...

-jk

[DukeBlueDevil]

On the printer, I've rebooted (power cycled) the printer multiple times. I've also gone through the wi-fi wizard a few times (which essentially finds my SSID and asks me to reauthenticate and reconnects). Each time it reconnects, has the same IP Address but no other device can reach it.

The printer does have an option for printing the Network Configuration:

Ip Address: 192.168.1.82
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 192.168.1.1
Configuration Source: DHCP
Primary DNS Server: 198.162.1.1

I don't see anywhere in the printers simple menu system where I can switch to a static IP (although it seems to use the same one no matter what I do).

So since my ability to actually troubleshoot is limited in this message board format, here are a few suggestions I can toss out as potential avenues.

1. Assuming 192.168.1.1 is your router, I'd try entering that in a browser to access the router console
2. Find the printer model and Google the error you're having. It's what I'd do if you gave me the printer model
3. Related to the one above, googling the model will probably give you an idea on how to set a static IP. Definitely recommend doing that
4. It's possible (depending on the model of the printer) that there is a browser console for the printer. Given that it's currently unreachable, you may have to plug it into Ethernet to access it and make configuration changes
5. Printers suck and anyone who's worked in IT will tell you that. You're not alone in this struggle

[DukeBlueDevil]

You're mixing your IP subnets in this message - 198.162.x.x v 192.168.x.x - I think something's amiss there.

Inside your home network everything will be 192.168.something (fairly usual), 10.something (not as likely as 192.168.something, but not too uncommon), or 172.something (fairly rare as a default setting). Well, unless you really know what you're doing, but then you'd know what you did...

-jk

Wow, completely missed that but that's probably it. Mixed up the 8 and the 2.

Would spork but need to spread it around

[cspan37421]

This topic deceived me into thinking a new BBQ restaurant opened by scientists had opened and I was super excited. You're all monsters. May God have mercy on your souls.

Not all nerds are scientists. Suppose such a restaurant was opened by accountants.

We could then no longer say that there's no accounting for taste.

[Nrrrrvous]

So since my ability to actually troubleshoot is limited in this message board format, here are a few suggestions I can toss out as potential avenues.

1. Assuming 192.168.1.1 is your router, I'd try entering that in a browser to access the router console
2. Find the printer model and Google the error you're having. It's what I'd do if you gave me the printer model
3. Related to the one above, googling the model will probably give you an idea on how to set a static IP. Definitely recommend doing that
4. It's possible (depending on the model of the printer) that there is a browser console for the printer. Given that it's currently unreachable, you may have to plug it into Ethernet to access it and make configuration changes
5. Printers suck and anyone who's worked in IT will tell you that. You're not alone in this struggle

You don't know how glad I am to hear you say that. I feel like I'm pretty tech-savvy, but I have had trouble for years with printers! Swore I'd never buy another Epson and so last year I bought a nice Brother and still can't get it to function 100% for longer than a week!!

[cspan37421]

Naturally my router decided to reset itself the moment DW's 5 hr conference started at noon. A quick hard reset and back in bidness.

Discovered a few interesting things in the meanwhile. The tl;dr version is that this is a known issue with some TP-Link routers and there's a long thread on it here:

https://community.tp-link.com/en/hom.../179006?page=1

by page 10 you get to today's date. In between, they have released a firmware update in beta (months ago!) that may help. It's not clear, but I'm going to try it later tonight, when DW conf. is done. Not much to lose. Hopefully the router-in-waiting (AX1800) doesn't have this issue too! I'd better search on that.

So ... I was getting the flashing power icon LED. Nothing else. Had I left it alone for a few minutes, it may have rebooted fully. Instead, I immediately hard-rebooted it (unplugged the power, counted to 10, re-plugged). Come to find out that indicator means it's either initializing, or doing a firmware upgrade, and if the latter, I should not unplug it! Ha ha. Well, I dove into the router settings, and there's no indication that it even CAN do firmware upgrades on its own. So I think basically all I did was interrupt its own restarting process, probably delaying its eventual reconnection. Haven't confirmed that, but the hard reboot ends up putting you into the same initialization indicator anyway.

w/r/t firmware upgrades, for some of them, TP-Link says you can't just "restore" settings with a backup file, you have to manually reconfigure it. So I've just spent a fair bit of time documenting my various settings (note taking and screenshots where it got really busy). It's amazing how many settings there are, and how many are just left as default values. Since we don't use most of the advanced features like guest network, file sharing, VPN, remote access, etc., I might only have to choose SSIDs, passwords, encryption type, etc.

So I'll give the beta firmware a try before giving up and deploying the new router.

[elvis14]

You're mixing your IP subnets in this message - 198.162.x.x v 192.168.x.x - I think something's amiss there.

Inside your home network everything will be 192.168.something (fairly usual), 10.something (not as likely as 192.168.something, but not too uncommon), or 172.something (fairly rare as a default setting). Well, unless you really know what you're doing, but then you'd know what you did...

-jk

That was a typo on my part. Like you said, everything inside my home network is 192.168.something. For example, my MacBook is 192.168.1.222 and the printer is 192.168.1.82, router is 192.168.1.1 etc. Sorry about that...for some reason it's one of those things that I do too often.

[elvis14]

So since my ability to actually troubleshoot is limited in this message board format, here are a few suggestions I can toss out as potential avenues.

1. Assuming 192.168.1.1 is your router, I'd try entering that in a browser to access the router console
2. Find the printer model and Google the error you're having. It's what I'd do if you gave me the printer model
3. Related to the one above, googling the model will probably give you an idea on how to set a static IP. Definitely recommend doing that
4. It's possible (depending on the model of the printer) that there is a browser console for the printer. Given that it's currently unreachable, you may have to plug it into Ethernet to access it and make configuration changes
5. Printers suck and anyone who's worked in IT will tell you that. You're not alone in this struggle

Thanks, I'll Google and see if I can figure out how to set this HP Evny 5660 to have a static IP. I can run a ethernet cable from the router to the printer if I need to (I have a few in my work bag). I tried to use a browser to get to it last night: timed out (expected since I can't even ping it). Naturally, I've Googled about the issue but most of the hits were a different issue (almost all were not being able to connect to the wifi and most were just telling the user to update their driver software on their devices).

I couldn't agree more about printers sucking. The sad thing about this printer is that it's a few years old and has been the best one I've had....no issues at all before now and HP instant ink has been great. It was working fine last weekend (my daughter prints math sheets on it a few days a week).