netgear wgr614 v4 needs 2-3 refreshes/retry to hit a Web page

I hope that subject line covered it.

I recently changed PPPoE DSL providers (a telephone company) and have been having trouble connecting to the Net since.

Here's the setup. Laptop running WIndows XP, DSL modem (speedstream 5260), Netgear WGR614 v4 router with the latest (and only) firmware 5.0_07. DSL is PPPoE with login.

Before the DSL provider switch, my connection whether direct to the modem or via the wifi router was virtually the same. There was no problem.

Since then, when connected via the router (wired to the router, not wifi, though the wifi performance is the same) service has become spotty.

Here's what happens. When I request a page, 9 times out of 10, I get an error "Server not found" (this is in Firefox. Explorer behaves as badly.) I then have to hit the Refresh or Try again button once or twice, before the page eventually loads. You can imagine this is annoying, having to refresh, refresh everytime one accesses the Web. By the second or third try, I get through.

If I bypass the router and plug directly into the modem, the pages all load first time, every time. Rebooting the modem, router, and PC have not helped performance.

The only thing that has changed recently was the DSL Provider. None of this was a problem before the switch. I should note that the new DSL service is one of those "lite" services (because I don't have big throughput needs.) "up to 512Kbps"

I have tried changing the router's timeout to 0 but that didn't improve things.

Any suggestions?

if the problem is with the service (or the "Lite" aspect of the service) I will change providers. It seems strange though that when wired directly to the modem, all is well, but with the router in place, the performance--even wired to the router--changes so radically. I didn't understand that a wired router connection could so degrade performance.

is there something about Lite that could cause this problem?

Many thanks

Reply to
pstock
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Just on the off chance: is this Sympatico? And are you getting an ip address from them that begins with 70?

You could also try using a different DNS in your router setup.

Reply to
Warren Oates

"pstock" hath wroth:

Hint: In order to get more working room on the page, my news reader does not display the subject line.

This should be an obvious clue if the provider was the only thing that changed. However, there were apparently other changes.

The Speedstream 5260 has some really nifty diagnostics. The problem is how to access them either directly or through the router. I usually use a 2nd computer and a hub or switch between the 5260 and the router. Setup this 2nd PC to 10.0.0.10 and telnet to the 5260 at: telnet 10.0.0.138 You should get something like:

Look for problems with SNR Margin, line levels, and error rates. There's a page somewhere on DSLReports.com that explain the buzzwords.

So, have you tried it directly to the modem without the router? If that works, you have a broken router..

That can easily be a flakey DNS server at your ISP. Try setting the DNS servers to some other nearby DNS servers on your XP client. It will ignore the DNS cache in the router and go directly to the DNS servers.

Also, I had exactly the same symptoms when I inserted a typo error for the primary DNS server. XP would wait about 15 seconds before giving up on the first DNS server, before going to the secondary.

That leaves:

  1. Broken router
  2. Bad ethernet cable between modem and router.
  3. Bad DNS servers.
Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

Many thanks both.

In the end, what was needed was sticking a straightened paper clip into the Reset hole on the back of the router and reentering the PPPoE login information.

So people, if you suspect a bad router, try not just a power cycle (unplugging, replugging) reboot, but a real reset.

Peter

Jeff Liebermann wrote:

Reply to
pstock

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