Flakey Network

[JohnBullard]

It went out again just after last post.

I have three units at my desk with a KVM switch, 2 wired, 1 wireless
One of the wired units is hardcoded at 192.168.2.50 - my HomeSeer server.

None would ping anywhere but themselves. Timed out pings to the router, to the modem, to any other machine on the network,

(I do have 2 cats that love to crawl around the modem and router, but they weren't anywhere the equiptment these past few times - don;t guess I can blame them )

 

[electron]

Does your system say that it lost network connectivity (i.e. "LAN cable has been unplugged")?

 

[JohnBullard]

no

I appreciate your help and questions though


Edit: what happens is everything (web) just quits responding. I can see the screen for my MCE machine on the orther side of the room (hardwired) and Orb does pop up a disconnect box.

 

[electron]

yeah that would be normal, the reason I asked if you got the XP system message is because XP can actually detect if there are cable issues (while Orb is just unable to talk to the Orb server).

If I read your previous posts correctly, you have 2 switches? Have you tried removing one of them at a time to see if maybe one of them is defective? Since you lose your connectivity between 2 systems, on the same switch, I would think that the problem is with the switch.

I would also recommend checking out the Event log, in case there are some other problems related to this.

 

[JohnBullard]

While the system was "working" I unplugged the cable modem from the router.

I could ping anywhere except the cable modem, as expected.

I understand you asking, and I will try anything, but how would a switch affect the wireless, since all of the switches are downstream from the router?

Since I can ping around at will with the cable modem disconnected, makes me suspect the new Linksys router, although I bought it Wednesday to replace my old router when I started having problems Tuesday evening.

The router is setting on top of a bookcase, airflow is normal, so I don't think a heat problem is shutting the router down.

But I ruled out internet, Comcast, and the cable modem, I think.

Guess I hook up my old router and see what happens, unless someone has other ideas.

Edit: Its after midnight, and tomorrow is a work day, so I'm going to bed. It will still be there tomorrow

 

[huggy59]

It could be a bad NIC or port on any device causing issues that keep the network down. A bad connection, for example, might keep a switch cycling in trying to add the port to the active list. Are you seeing any indication of flooding or overload (some routers or switches have a collision LED)?

If you are pinging by computer name and you don't run your own DNS, it could be a problem with the local MS Browse Master computer negotiations. I'd try turning off the capability to become a Browse Master on all machines but your HS (statically-addressed) machine. The Browse Master is the machine that maintains the network list of all machines on the network. When machines are turned on or their network addresses otherwised changed, the machines will talk to each other to determine which is to become the master browser to hold the network list. This takes a minute and then it may take longer to populate the list to all machines (several minutes).

It could also be a very short DHCP lease, or a competing DHCP server (did you leave the old router on and hooked up?). To get around this possible problem, put static IPs on all machines and shut off the DHCP server(s). Also, in tests, always use the IP address for pings, etc. It avoids the name-to-IP conversion issues.

If you want, load up Ethereal on one of the wireless machines and save a capture file around the event. That may see something that would tell us the problem. I can interpret the capture for you if you wish. Promise I'm a white hacker! ;-)

Even though you don't see another wireless network ADVERTISED, it could still be there. Best to make sure all your machines can only connect to YOUR wireless network and that you've changed all the settings so your wireless network is different than any other. And yes, it could be a 2.4GHz device interfering, such as a wireless camera or phone system (CyberGenie).

And finally, it could also be spyware, virus, trojan, etc. Make sure you are up to date and scan everything.

 

[huggy59]

PS, it's not possible you have a wired loop (two connections) between the switches and/or router, is it?

Only other things I can think of is bad cabling (crimp) or jack, power supply failure or overheating...

 

[JohnBullard]

Thanks for your ideas and suggestions Gordon.

I'm at work now, but will try and report tonight.

I was pinging by IP address, not name.

Old router completely disconnected and power unplugged.

I did check one thing just before I went to bed last night, the firmware date in the router was sometime back in 2004. I plan to see it there are any firmware updates when I get home.

 

[Mike]

You noted earlier you could not ping the router. That seems to imply the router as well. Then again, have you swapped the cable between the computer and router? You were also using the local IP address, so DNS can not be involved.

On the earlier item on DNS servers, I thought most ISP's sent down 3 DNS servers (usually sequential addresses), and if one is down, it will go to the next one. That's why I thought it strange even though one went down. Of course perhaps it only 'partly' went down, causing additional issues.

It should not have this symptom, but have you upgraded the firmware in the router?

The only piece left is the NIC. Then again if you have another laptop or computer you can replicate the issue on that machine as well, it should rule out the nic and the cable. By the way, is that a WRT-54G you got? you wrote WRK-54G. I looked and they did have a WRK but the latest firmware is from 2003 and 2004 respectively. If you can return it, you may be able to get a newer model (although that does not explain your issues).

 

[TCassio]

This is definitly a local network problem not a DNS problem. I would start by eliminating all cable and all computers except for 1. If things run okay, then add a second the a third, until you find the problem. Its either going to be a bad cable or NIC card.

 

[JohnBullard]

Thanks for all the comments and trouble shooting ideas.

The DNS thing was based on past history with Comcast, but I have since ruled that out.

I can disconnect all wired machines from the router, at the router, and just operate wireless, that may confirm a nic card, if everything remains stable on just wireless. Then hook them back up one at a time, and only one at a time, to try to find the bad one.

If I go down while only using wireless, I'll swap back in my old router and see if it's stable.

Once again, I appreciate all of your collective brain power, and trouble shooting ideas.

I'll keep the board posted with updates and ideas.

 

[JohnBullard]

Wireless only has been stable for over 4 hours now.

Just hooked the HomeSeer (HS2) server back, directly to the router, not through a switch.

I have the remote speaker client runing on three wireless conections. They will log the time if they disconnect from the server if the network goes down tonight or Sat while I'm at work.

Then I'll connect another box directly (not through a switch) and see what happens tomorrow evening.

 

[huggy59]

One more thought: is it possible you had two machines ont he same IP address? Somehow a snafu in the DHCP or one statically assigned to an IP address within the DHCP range? XP will attempt to inform you of a duplicate IP address, but it is not allways consistent.

Hope it's all stable for you now, but it would be nice to find out exactly what caused it. Those are the worst problems to diagnose!

 

[JohnBullard]

I think its down to a bad nic or cable.

The 3 wireless boxes kept a solid connection to the router and the HomeSeer server for over 8 hours.

As soon as I pluged in the cable to my Media Center, the network crashed.
Unpluged it, had to power cycle the router, then it's back up. I'll swap the cable on it when I get back in this afternoon, and if it still crashes, replace the nic. Just going to leave it unplugged for now.

I'll add the network printer to the 3 wireless & HS server, and see how that combination does while I'm at work today.

Once again, I really appreciate all of your ideas and suggestions that you have given me.