Internet Connection Issue

S

Smolenski7

Member
The WiFi in my house seems to go out every few days. And I mean just the wireless, not the wired connections. This has been happening for about 2-3 years now. I thought it was a combination of my old provider (Frontier in CT) and their old equipment (specifically their dated Motorola router) they forced me to use. So, I dumped Frontier and hired Xfinity by Comcast and bought my own router, an Arris Surfboard SVG2482AC DOCSIS 3.0 Dual-Band router. Wired download speeds are about 120 mpbs and wireless speeds range from a very low of 4mpbs to 45mbps. Yes, that's a pretty big range. I really haven't figured out the cause, but I can tell you it has nothing to do with how close the device is to the router.

My thought is that there are just too many devices in the house vying for space on the router. I counted 37 devices online and offline in the router's settings. In fact, I just got the attached error message saying that no more than 16 devices can be added. Is this router just not capable of handling so many devices? Is there something in the settings that I can configure to help?
 

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So all wireless devices are slow or just one? You might have some radio interference in your house somewhere, meaning there is an appliance of some sort that may be causing wireless interference. What internet speed are you supposed to be getting and paying for? Can you post screenshots of speedtests using wired and wireless from www.speedtest.net?
 
johnb35 said:
So all wireless devices are slow or just one? You might have some radio interference in your house somewhere, meaning there is an appliance of some sort that may be causing wireless interference. What internet speed are you supposed to be getting and paying for? Can you post screenshots of speedtests using wired and wireless from www.speedtest.net?
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When the issue arises, only some wireless devices drop while others seem to be fine. It is very rare that a wired device, like my desktop computer, will drop. It has been known to happen, but not often. I am paying for 100mbps. The wired desktop gets over that consistently, as you can see. My wireless laptop, however, does not. It consistently gets 20-25mbps.
 

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What kind of appliances do you have near the vicinity of the router? Are you connecting via 2.4 ghz or 5 ghz band?
 
johnb35 said:
What kind of appliances do you have near the vicinity of the router? Are you connecting via 2.4 ghz or 5 ghz band?
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It is a dual band router. Some devices connect via 2.4ghz and some 5ghz. I do not select which devices connect using what band, it is done automatically. I've attached a portion of the devices listed in the router. Most are 2.4ghz, but some are 5ghz, and of course some are connected via ethernet. I didn't include the ethernet connected devices on the attachment, for the most part.

Devices in the same room as the router are: 2 desktop computers, television, and Directv cable box that are all wired connections. There is an X-box gaming concole and a HP printer that are connected wirelessly. In the adjoining room there is an Amazon Alexa, Nest smoke/CO2 detector, and of course any phones or laptops that happen to be used in that room.
 

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As far as appliances go, I meant like what type of other electronics in the area like fridgerators, etc. Anything can cause wireless interference if its not shielded properly. have you tried changing the wireless channel used?
 
There are no other appliances in the area. It's located in an office on the second floor of the home.

I tried manually changing the bands (2.4ghz vs. 5ghz) if that's what you mean by changing the wireless channel. This was not as easy as I thought it would be and became a little intimidating. I did, however, give it the ole' college try. I changed the band on a few (maybe 2 or 3) devices that I use all of the time, but it didn't seem to make a difference. In fact, my desktop computer actually went off line and it's a wired connection that I don't think I touched. As a result, I reset the router back to factory spec's.
 
Try slicing out your bands into their own SSIDs, allocate low bandwidth ones like TVs to 2.4 and keep your others on 5 GHz. You'll probably see the 2.4 side cut out more since a lot more commodity/consumer grade stuff just uses that band (called ISM) and it's a common interference vector with other things like microwaves and baby monitors.

I've used 36 devices on my network with a single AP (Ubiquiti nanoHD) but can pull a couple hundred megabit from a couple rooms away.
 
johnb35 said:
This is what I meant. https://arris.secure.force.com/cons...e-Wireless-Channel/?l=en_US&fs=RelatedArticle
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Yes, that is exactly what I tried. It was a bit intimidating for several reasons. One, I had no idea which devices to change. It seemed to be a random decision. Two, the directions actually state, " It is recommended to leave the Channel Selection at Automatic and restart the SVG2482AC. The best Wi-Fi channel will be selected upon restart." So, why would I change the channel if the router is going to select the best choice for me?
 
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