IP Address keeps changing, what would cause this?

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AMD_Gamer

Fully [H]
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Jan 20, 2002
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All the sudden the internet connection in my apartment has gone to shit. Extremely slow, and every few minutes does not work at all for a few seconds.

I live in a large apartment complex so i tried to run an IP scanner to see if maybe people hacked the WEP key and were on our connection Nothing odd showed up.

Upon investigating further i noticed that my IP address keeps changing, every minute or so the IP address keeps going up. I don't know a problem with the signal that is fine.

This is very strange, never had this problem before.

What could cause this strange behavior. It seems like the router is overloaded and keep resetting itself?
 
I'm sure you may have already tried this but swap out the router and see what happens.
 
I would change the encryption to WPA2 and if nothing else change the password on the encryption key.
Also you could set a static IP on your computer, but won't fix the suspicious activity on your network.
 
Factory default the router first then, yeah put some WPA on that thing. WPA2 if it and your computers support it
 
i saw this recently on a house call i was at. the problem turned out to be that someone else had a router by the same manufacturer. they both had the same ssid and it was causing confusion on witch router to connect to. it would keep swapping back and forth between the two. so i would recommend changing the ssid and see what happens.
 
does the router keep losing it's connection with the ISP, or does your computer keep losing connection with your router?
what IP keeps changing; your computer's IP or the router's WAN IP?
Have you tried bypassing the router to verify whether or not it's the cause?
 
tricky0502 said:
i saw this recently on a house call i was at. the problem turned out to be that someone else had a router by the same manufacturer. they both had the same ssid and it was causing confusion on witch router to connect to. it would keep swapping back and forth between the two. so i would recommend changing the ssid and see what happens.
Click to expand...

ahh maybe thats it, the SSID is the default NETGEAR.

I would never set it up like that, I am just here subleasing for a few months so never bothered to play around with the connection until now.

I will change it tonight.
 
tricky0502 said:
did the changing of the ssid work?
Click to expand...

i used Vistumbler to look at the SSID's in the area and did not see any other NETGEAR ap's. Could an SSID with NETGEAR that is setup to not be broadcast the SSID cause the same problem?


Also i think i figured out that it is just a shitty router and craps out when running bittorrent.
 
AMD_Gamer said:
i used Vistumbler to look at the SSID's in the area and did not see any other NETGEAR ap's. Could an SSID with NETGEAR that is setup to not be broadcast the SSID cause the same problem?
Click to expand...
Yes it can because you'll have two signals, one that says that its being broadcasted and one that says it isn't. Its like seeing two people, but one is a clone, and you can't tell which is which.
 
Change what channel it's broadcasting?

Maybe every other router is on the same channel
 
Mister Natural said:
I would change the encryption to WPA2 and if nothing else change the password on the encryption key.
Also you could set a static IP on your computer, but won't fix the suspicious activity on your network.
Click to expand...

Agreed. If you have WEP then you effectively don't have security as it can be cracked in under a minute now if you have a lot of traffic going when someone attempts to break in.

Mister Natural said:
I would change the encryption to WPA2 and if nothing else change the password on the encryption key.
Also you could set a static IP on your computer, but won't fix the suspicious activity on your network.
Click to expand...

Static is the way to go in order to minimize troubleshooting efforts.

tricky0502 said:
i saw this recently on a house call i was at. the problem turned out to be that someone else had a router by the same manufacturer. they both had the same ssid and it was causing confusion on witch router to connect to. it would keep swapping back and forth between the two. so i would recommend changing the ssid and see what happens.
Click to expand...

LOL, this can also be a problem. Make sure the ssid is unique. I also suggest disabling it from from broadcasting.

f1y said:
Change what channel it's broadcasting?

Maybe every other router is on the same channel
Click to expand...

This is also a possibility. Fire up Netstumbler and see what channel the APs in your area are all using. They should be on 1, 6, or 11. Find the one that's least used and set that as the one in your AP. Also, be mindful that they're 5 steps away from the closest channel so you minimize interference. The key thing to keep in mind is that wireless is just like using an old Hub for your network. Everything is broadcast based. The more people you have transmitting in the same frequency space, the less bandwidth and more "collisions" you'll have. Channels help separate the traffic at the frequency spectrum level. However, channels bleed over from one to another and it takes a 5 channel different to not get that bleedover effect, hence 1, 6, and 11 being the ones that should be used. When everyone is using 11 and 6, then you'll want to use 1. Naturally what ends up happening though is some dumbass decides to use channel 2 so he's "unique" not realizing his AP is now squelching everyone on 1 and 6 and everything in between. Ass.
 
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BobSutan said:
They should be on 1, 6, or 11. Find the one that's least used and set that as the one in your AP. Also, be mindful that they're 5 steps away from the closest channel so you minimize interference.
However, channels bleed over from one to another and it takes a 5 channel different to not get that bleedover effect, hence 1, 6, and 11 being the ones that should be used. When everyone is using 11 and 6, then you'll want to use 1. Naturally what ends up happening though is some dumbass decides to use channel 2 so he's "unique" not realizing his AP is now squelching everyone on 1 and 6 and everything in between. Ass.
Click to expand...

i am one of those asses!!!

i know it should be on 1, 6, 11. my dlink 4300 has a spread spectrum for channels. i just looked right now and it is on 3. should i manually set it 1, 6, 11?

also i dont think netstumbler works on 7. is there something else i could use?
 
tricky0502 said:
i am one of those asses!!!

i know it should be on 1, 6, 11. my dlink 4300 has a spread spectrum for channels. i just looked right now and it is on 3. should i manually set it 1, 6, 11?

also i dont think netstumbler works on 7. is there something else i could use?
Click to expand...

First off read this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11#Channels_and_international_compatibility

One consequence is that stations can only use every fourth or fifth channel without overlap, typically 1, 6 and 11 in the Americas
Click to expand...

Now as for your question, absolutely change it to 1, 6, or 11. Rule of thumb is to select the one with the least amount of other APs using that channel.
 
AMD_Gamer said:
Also i think i figured out that it is just a shitty router and craps out when running bittorrent.
Click to expand...

Makes sense to me, almost every time I get a call about a misbehaving wireless network, it is a Netgear. The WGR614 seems to be a popular piece of crap. And yes, some of them were resetting every few minutes under any type of load. Except for the wndr3700, I wouldn't touch a Netgear wireless router (or most consumer wireless routers for that matter). Do some research and find a model with a stable chipset. There are a bunch out there, but they are mixed in with all the crap being sold.
 
I have seen "misbehaving wireless networks" that didn't involve a Netgear router at all. Home routers are inexpensive devices and of course they won't measure up to the business class stuff. Now there are other brand routers that I think suck but I don't want to derail this thread.
 
I didn't miss it, there are good and bad consumer routers, Netgear imo doesn't stand out as one of the worst. You get a good consumer router and it will work for years under normal conditions. The average Joe will be happy with it. For the people who want something more robust then business grade stuff is the way to go.

As for the OP's problem the router could have just taken a dump, it happens at times no matter what the brand.
 
I have a Netgear that I had to power cycle almost daily. But, one thing that you want to check is to make sure you have the latest firmware. I noticed that mine started to work a bit better after that.
 
AMD_Gamer said:
ahh maybe thats it, the SSID is the default NETGEAR.

I would never set it up like that, I am just here subleasing for a few months so never bothered to play around with the connection until now.

I will change it tonight.
Click to expand...

NOOB!

just kidding. but year man you gotta change that shit, and also check the passwords too. remember it's your computer and your data behind that firewall. Don't you want to protect it? WEP is shit. use WPA2 with AES
 
AMD_Gamer said:
All the sudden
Click to expand...

http://grammartips.homestead.com/sudden.html



But yea, I'd suggest changing the SSID, turning on WPA2 as well... Make your network unique and secure- that'll probably fix alot of issues.
Also, you might try a static IP and see what happens. Does it work for a long period of time? If so, something is triggering DHCP to kick in. As you said, it could be a drop in connection due to the router crapping out.
 
turns out there are way too many AP's within range of me, about 30 and another 20 or so that fade in and out.

I scanned with Vistumbler to see what channels are not being used a lot and 3 looked good so,I changed the default channel to 3 and now everything is working fine.
 
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AMD_Gamer said:
turns out there are way too many AP's within range of me, about 30 and another 20 or so that fade in and out.

I scanned with Vistumbler to see what channels are not being used a lot and 3 looked good so,I changed the default channel to 3 and now everything is working fine.
Click to expand...

the way the channels work you shouldnt use 3. you should only use 1, 6, 11.

a wise man told me to read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11#Channels_and_international_compatibility

on 3, channels 1 and 6 will interfere with you.
 
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