Very odd and frustrating home network and VoIP problems

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Rurik

Supreme [H]ardness
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Sep 29, 2000
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Small home network, Internet through Comcast (6MBps down), and VoIP through ATT Callvantage.

Motorola SB5120 cable modem feeding into a Linksys RT41P2 MTA VoIP router. The RT41P2 is serving DHCP to the network. A Linksys BEFW11S4 wireless WAP is also connected, on the same subnet and with DHCP disabled. 4 wired computers spread between the two routers, and 4 wireless devices. Both routers have the latest firmware.

The first problem is that whatever router is coming directly off of the cable modem randomly stops routing traffic to the Internet. It usually happens in the middle of the night, but at least once a day. The router is still up, and all of the devices can talk to each other, but they can't ping the router (gateway) and can't get to the Internet. I moved the MTA router behind the WAP (basically swapped the two), and now the WAP router is doing the same thing and the MTA is staying up all the time. This all started suddenly about 4 months ago, and sometimes it may go 2-3 days between stops, but it's very common.

I had similar problems with this WAP long ago, when it was the only thing I used. If WEP was enabled, the Internet would stop working every few hours until I disabled WEP. With WEP off, it ran flawlessly. With it behind the MTA, it has never acted up but now that it's out front again, it seems to be exhibiting the same problems again.

The second is with VoIP, and I'm near the point of homicide on this. About 4 months ago we started having problems with the VoIP. When a phone call was in place, Internet traffic would basically stop. Calls were dropped left and right. About 3 weeks ago, our VoIP became unusable. We could receive calls, and hear the people on the other end, but they can never hear us. CallVantage says its Comcast's problem. Comcast has been out 5 times now, run an entirely new line to our house and through our house. They came out again today, and the signal was perfect. CallVantage refuses to acknowledge its their problem. So, we have no phone in our house, in a cell dead-zone; we're completely cut off. I think it's time to get rid of VoIP...
 
Yeah, this seems to be an open and shut case; The router is dying.

Have you tried a replacement router yet?
 
But the router only dies when it's directly connected to the cable modem and is handling all traffic. Once it's moved to the back, it works perfectly fine. And, the other router that works perfect starts dying once put in the front role.
 
Rurik said:
But the router only dies when it's directly connected to the cable modem and is handling all traffic. Once it's moved to the back, it works perfectly fine. And, the other router that works perfect starts dying once put in the front role.
Click to expand...

Seems like two bad routers then. That or the cable modem. But if the cable company has been out and says it's fine, then I'd bank on the routers.

Another thing to look at is your power. Do you have a UPS you can put on the circuit?
 
I had similiar problems with the Linksys router supplied with Vonage, as well as a Linksys WRT54G v5. I chalked it up to the routers overheating due to the load placed on them. I now use a WRT54GS v2.2 running DD-WRT firmware and a standalone Vonage phone adapter. No problems. I've only restarted it once in six months, and that was just to update the DD-WRT firmware to a new release. I've also had success in getting other people's WRT54G v5 and v6 routers stabilized by installing DD-WRT.
 
It sounds like there is a lot of traffic on your network, and most likley a lot of new/closing connections. At least when I bought my linksys router, this was a death sentence for them, since it would continue to keep routing table entires for connections that were dead up to 5 days earlier. Try to get one of the third-party firmware releases, if none are available for your model then I highly recommend you go out and buy a WRT54<something> that has ddwrt available. I personally run HyperWRT, but will be switching to DD-WRT sometime soon. Just look around to make sure you really can adjust the TCP/UDP timeouts.
 
I think you guys are right. I run a lot of torrent traffic, that and I have 7 computers/devices all running through it. It sounds like the number of connections made is overwhelming it. I'm going to hunt for a wrt54g; I've been wanting one anyhow. That should at least take care of the problem of the Internet cutting out all the time.

Now, if I could just figure out the VoIP problem.
 
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