yet another set of rtp300 issues

Posts: 2 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 05, 2006 Posts: 2

hey everyone

ok i have had this setup for several months and here are the problems i have been having so far. first i should list the network setup i have.
road runner service
Ambit modem U10c108
router RTP300 v1.00.58
2 pc's
1 PS2
1 xbox360 (was a regular xbox)
1 phone.

first one issue is I have to change the DMZ address for each game console EVERY time i want to use it online. i have tried tcp and udp port forwarding for both of these selecting the entire port range available with no success so far.I might not be doing it correctly, because when I try this i lose all internet conectivity to the consoles.

secondly the router randomly loses its clients list. I have the lease time set to 7 days. When it does this it causes the ip addresses of all the components to change. for the pc's its not an issue but i have to go to the clients list to find out what ip is set to what so i can use either game console online. i have also set the number of addresses to 5. I tried setting it to 4 but the PS2 dissapears from the client list. I am figuring the reason is for the phone service.

and for the router's last and most interesting trick, it will randomly loose internet connectivity but not phone service. example: everything is working fine one night. shut all the pc's and game units off then go to bed. fire up the pc the next day and no internet, absolutely no packets recived at all on either pc, and game consoles cant connect either, but the phone still works. Question

i have to unplug the router for a few seconds and then plug it back in so the internet will work. also you cant access the router from a web browser till this has been done. it doesnt do this all the time just every now and then. sometimes days sometimes a month or so.

thanks in advance

Posts: 1 · New Forum Member Joined: Nov 06, 2005 Posts: 1

Prior Poster stated Problem #3 was:
"and for the router's last and most interesting trick, it will randomly loose internet connectivity but not phone service. example: everything is working fine one night. shut all the pc's and game units off then go to bed. fire up the pc the next day and no internet, absolutely no packets recived at all on either pc, and game consoles cant connect either, but the phone still works. i have to unplug the router for a few seconds and then plug it back in so the internet will work. also you cant access the router from a web browser till this has been done. it doesnt do this all the time just every now and then. sometimes days sometimes a month or so. "

I began noticing this under heavy network loads with 7 PC's on GB Enet internally and shortly after installing RTP300 as primary router.

I also must power-cycle router when it occurs - it appears to be "high traffic" related - particularly upstream sustained traffic.

I TURNED OFF QOS in the router config and it seems to get better - however, QOS is enabled after power-up (setting is not sticky like other config settings). If you see this problem, try turning OFF QOS.

When in the "lost connectivity" state, the router seems "partially hung" with some intermittent connectivity possible during the failure - it also may allow partial access to configuration screens and admin login to the router but the admin browser may simply hang during a page refresh waiting forever (like the RTP300 just "forgot" to send the data requested). My "educated guess" with little knowledge of the black box is that QOS is causing the darn thing to discard packets at some traffic levels (lost interrupts internally...?) With QOS ON the router often loses connectivity in just minutes of traffic/use - but with QOS off it seems to last much longer (does Voip provisioning re-enable QOS? Is that why it's not sticky on PowerCycle...? Does Vonage reprovision the router periodically and thus re-enable QOS...?)

We need new FW updates to the RTP300 to fix issues like this - I saw the prior post and decided to add to it, but I'll likely (today) put the RTP300 on the backend of the network behind my aging Nexland Pro800Turbo for now (or a new router) and forget about outbound QOS and traffic prioritization - I already know this makes the Vonage service unusable here as the Pro800 does not have any QOS support and performs poorly with Voip traffic during high network loading (not sure if a new router would help there) - but internet connectivity needs to be maintained first-and-foremost(and QOS should reduce bandwidth not drop packets and interfere with basic connection). A really bad aspect of this problem is that once the router fails, it never recovers - it's not just "lost for few seconds" - it's lost for good - really nice for those of us who travel and use remote access to get to our local network (vnc or similar). I don't (yet) have a remote POWER CYCLE switch for my house, but CISCO sure makes me want one...

If you see this post and work for Cisco/Linksys or Vonage, file a live bug report and get us an update. This one is live and something is wrong with the RTP300 - and you have two independent sightings on one day. I'm sure this forum is loaded with this problem - or you have few users actually using the firewall/nat/wan side of this device.

Thanks,
Another SW Engineer