A strange router problem?

Smurg · #1 July 4th, 2007, 03:25 PM

I have a Netgear 814v2 and I've had it for a number of years. I use it in conjunction with a Motorola Surfboard modem and my computer is directly connected to the router and other computers in my household use wireless access cards to use the network.

As of the past few days there has been a strange problem, the internet has been a little slower and having a bit more trouble connecting to gateways (I sometimes have to try multiple times to actually make the connection) aside from this at seemingly random intervals my internet will disconnect entirely without any warning. There is no connectivity warning or anything like that - it just stops working.

Usually I restart my connection manually by pulling the power cord out of both the modem and router and then connecting to the modem, waiting till it's on 'Online' status and then plugging in my router. This is the correct method and it's always worked. The first time this happened my connection was up and running again and I was relieved...yet it was a bit sluggish and had strange connectivity issues with gateways etc.

Now this has happened fairly frequently over the past two days so I'm not sure what the cause is. I also noticed I cannot connect to my router very well at all using the 192.168.0.1 IP, it's slow and sometimes it's not responsive at all. I tried unplugging the modem and then used the router solely on its own and it was working perfectly, as in I could connect to it at normal speed (the usual response times as always when there was no problem etc.)

So I am unaware if there is a problem with the router or modem...or somehow they aren't interacting as normal anymore.

I greatly appreciate any help or advice people might have.

p.s. As an end note, I thought I might mention this although it might be unrelated - I installed Windows Service Pack 2 for the second time ever (last time I installed it it disabled my wireless connection...it just wouldn't show up. However since I am now directly wired I figured it was about time to install Service Pack 2 as there are a fair few pieces of software that require it nowadays.) My Dad using wireless on a laptop had told me a few times the day after I'd install it that the net was dropping frequently. After my first login with Service Pack 2 my internet never worked and it was giving me "Limited or no connectivity messages." Now I don't know if Service Pack 2 is the update with which these messages were introduced...or it was some weird issue with the network and SP2 but I'd never had these messages before. I uninstalled SP2 and my net worked again...but it now had the problems I talked about in my post. The thing is this was my first login after the night before I had installed SP2 so I had no means of knowing if this issue had existed outside of SP2 or was caused by it.

But I see no reason why SP2 would destroy my connection and that of the entire network.

Thanks in advance.

ecross · #2 July 4th, 2007, 06:49 PM

Hello Smurg,

The Limited or No Connectivity messages that you see is actually a new in Service Pack 2 in Windows XP. However, this just means that a computer running XP cannot connect to the DHCP Server and an ip addressed in the 169.254.x.x is received. This never changed but the messages that you see make it easier for people aware what's happening.

Is this a problem with every computer on the network or just one of them? If it's with every computer, not just the XP machine then I would be more inclined that it's a problem with the router. If you haven't already, I also suggest you look at this MS KB Article:

You may receive a "Limited or no connectivity" message on a computer that is connected to the Internet by a DSL modem or a cable modem after you install Windows XP Service Pack 2
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/892896

Wrkngman · #3 July 5th, 2007, 03:11 AM

I believe your problem is with the router. I know very little about netgear however I can tell you that you should have software that came with the router- install it then go to the website and get the updates for the software then open the program and configure your connections using the software and don't let Windows configure it. If you cannot achieve this with Netgear I would recommend Linksys model WRT54GS I have one and have had excellent results with it.

Archangel122184 · #4 July 5th, 2007, 01:30 PM

From your full description of the problem, this sounds like your internet connection is flooded with connection requests. This does effect your router since the router must use its memory to keep track of all connections it maintains which will greatly effect your ability to manage it if the connects aren't outright refused.

Since you have a shared connection, try turning off the computer that has the problems and trying your connection on the other computer(s). If it/they connect without a problem you can be assured that there is either malfunctioning software or malware on the computer that is currently having problems.

Smurg · #5 July 5th, 2007, 02:24 PM

Thanks everyone, the thing is the computer that is directly into the router is never used. It hasn't been the entire time - I've got the modem directly connected to a hub at the moment and it is working fine. I think I'll get a new router however this one is several years old and might be past its prime anyhow.

Thanks for all the advice.