[cmt]

I've had a cable modem and router set up in my house almost from first day cable access was available in my area. The router is a Linksys Etherfast cable/dsl model. No wireless, just hardwires. There are two Macs in the network, my 600 mhz iMac and my son's 1.24 20 iMac G4. Both machines are running 10.3.8

everything has been fine for years, until just recently. Our network connections will degrade, then die. Pressing in the re-set on the router will return things to normal, sometimes. Other times, I have to power off the router and the cable modem and restart them both. The problem has gotten worse in the last two weeks. My son has become lost in the "World of WarCraft". He was able to play without issue up until about a week ago. Now, when he gets on the game, the connection grinds to a halt in about 5 minutes.

I tried to forward the ports suggested by the game to his system, using the admin screens for the router, but after doing this, his network connection died completly. While accessing the admin screens I got errors from the web browser about not being able to access "stuff" (sorry, I did not write the errors down). I've used the admin screens many times and never had any problems.

For yucks, I shut the whole thing down, and connected the kid directly to the cable modem and turned him loose. His connection was running like a banshee all night. So I fairly sure the issue is in the router.

Since this has been an off-and-on problem for a while, and since the admin screens were barking errors for no reason I can think of, I am assuming that the router may just be too old to keep up with the times, or that dust or something has made it flaky. Before I run out and by a new one, I was wondering it anyone had another opinion?

I'd try to update the firmware, but I need a PC and don't have access to one at home.

Any stories or advice would be appreciated.

[ghporter]

It sounds like you have an older version of the BEFSR41 router. These work best when they're cool, but their little legs aren't long enough to keep them elevated enough for proper airflow. I put mine up on four 35mm film cans-take the lids off and the router's feet fit right in the open tops of the cans. Don't put a Linksys router on top of anything that gets warm, or the router will overheat fairly easily, particularly the original version of the BEFSR41.

It's been noted elsewhere that Linksys' browser interface isn't really happy with working with Safari. Linksys uses a lot of Java, and it isn't necessarily "well coded," so sometimes you'll run into problems. I've had good success with Firefox on both PC and Mac platforms.

It's also possible that you're running into cables that have degraded, particularly the ones that go to your LAN ports. Inspect all of them, particularly at the connectors, and replace any that are suspect.

Finally, it's a good idea to turn the router off and let it sit for a while every now and then. These boxes use a proprietary version of Linux, and aren't necessarily guaranteed not to have memory leaks. After a while they need a good cold boot to clear out the RAM and get things working properly.

[cmt]

The little spud has been sitting in the same place for several years. I sits on a shelf under my computer table. As I got under there to check some of the things you suggested I noticed that the dust was thick enough to plant crops in. (I told you it had been sitting there for a while). I checked the cables and they seem fine. When I take the old router out of the picture, by connecting either of the computers directly to the cable modem, the problems go away. So I'm pretty sure the cables are OK.

I had always used IE on my Mac to run the admin setups, and had never had a problem before. Now I was not in the habit of messing with it often, but I have had to change setting from time to time as my ISP changed things.

I suspect that part of teh dust bowl that had formed on the shelf has found its way into the inards of the router and caused some issue. That or it finally sat there long enough that the overheating took its toll.

I've been thinking about upgrading to a wireless router anyway. Maybe now is a good time.

Thanks

[ghporter]

Originally posted by cmt:
I've been thinking about upgrading to a wireless router anyway. Maybe now is a good time.

It could well be, particularly since there have been some improvements in how their wired routers do their thing. Interestingly, Linksys' 802.11G wireless router, the WRT54G, is at least on a par in price with the current version of the BEFSR41. I got a new BEFSR41 for $40 after rebate just last month (my original version '41 had committed suicide by diving off a 6' high shelf).

[cmt]

Well, I went out and bought a new router. Turns out I may have been able to save myself some money.

I purchased a Netgear wireless router (in hopes of some day have a wireless laptop). Hooked it up and things worked great... for one evening. (I turned the wireless part off for now)

Last night the same behavior returned. Things running along fine, then turning painfully slow, then coming to a stop. This time I called Comcast. Their tech had me do the "shut it all off, turn it all on" routine. Low and behold, the cable modem does not reconnect. Service call scheduled for Friday.

However, an hour later I notice the lights all on the cable modem, so I fire the router back up and things are fine... for an hour. Then lags times you could measure with a calendar. Call Comcast again, hoping they can gather more data.

This time the "restart" sequence gets the modem back right away, and things run fine the rest of the evening.

The service call remains scheduled for Friday, and the cable modem is going back to the Comcast office for a swap out today. It is older than the previous router, and I know they have flashed the firmware from their end several times. Maybe that will cure it.

[cmt]

I thought I'd make one last post to this discussion with the outcome of the whole situation.

Well, it was not the cable modem, or the router, but a cut in the insulation on the coax that ran to specific wall jack in the "computer room". So, I have a new router and new modem, but neither bit of hardware was the problem.

I'd like to give a hat's off to some fellow named Charlie at Comcast. When I put the new cable modem in place, it would not work at all. So I called their customer support line again, assuming something needed to be reset on their end. I spent 85 minutes on the phone with Charlie. He actually knew what he was doing, and we went through a very systematic approach to finally determine that when I connected the cable modem to a cable connection in another room, it worked. When I told him I was using a Mac, he even knew Macs, and had me in the Terminal, issuing ping commands to try to figure out where things were going wrong. Very refreshing to fine a help desk guy who knows what he is doing, and who also knows Macs.

When the repair guy got there on Friday, he worked his way backward from the bad wall jack and found a cut in the insulation where that line entered the house. (I must have hit it with a weedwacker) Easy fix, and things have been flawless since.

The moral of the story, sometimes it’s just the wire.

Thanks to everyone for their help!

[Insaneous]

I encountered a very similar issue with a friend. All of the symptoms were the same. We called Comcast and they sent a technician out. He determined that the line voltage was low, but the fault was a neighbor's house so it affected everyone in the subnet. The line crew came out a couple days later and repaired the problem. Glad to hear that there you found a good Mac guy on the phone, they are hard to come by.

Matt

[ghporter]

CMT, that's great! I mean the absolutely outstanding kind of great! The only trouble is that not every broadband provider is so knowledgable or customer oriented. The only thing I don't like about my SBC DSL is that SBC is "the phone company." You know the line: "we don't care-we don't have to."

Anyway, Time-Warner here isn't that great in the customer service end either-they subcontract out so much of their installation and apparently their service too, that you never know if the guy that shows up will know anything about the cable, much less cable Internet. A friend of mine is moving this week, and shifting from DSL to Time-Warner cable, so I'll find out what they're like pretty quickly. Not that I'm going to switch, but I like to know about the market.

Again, congratulations both on getting your connection back to being reliable, and in finding out that you can depend on your provider to actually "provide" service.