RT2500 Wireless Card "Losing Internet"

i dunno; You said ,,, lose the ability to make new connections to the Internet until I reboot ,,, Sounds like you've said it is losing dns lookup. Which is more of the operating systems job as well as the Router should/could be handling it too... Might try redo of your network settings for dns if fixed,,, or the routers dns.

Personally I use Treewalk locally for dns because my isp dns isn't the fastest thing.

FWiW I have a Hawking pcmcia version or card bus version of that card With flat panel flip&twist hi-gain RT2500 Driver Version 3.0.5.0 from HawkingTec whom has a forum linked from the driver page. had it a long time,,, always works fine.

Would that also affect access to my mail servers?

I've tried flushing the DNS cache in ipconfig when this happens, but I don't believe it cleared it up.

If it was losing DNS lookup, would that mean that the problem is completely unrelated to the wireless card?

To partially answer my own question, I turned off the RT2500 and decided to play around with a ZyDAS 1211 USB unit for a while. The identical thing happened. Seems like every hour or two, I can't connect until I reboot, though any existing connections (as described above) remain intact.

Whatever this is, it doesn't appear to be dependent on the wireless unit.

Anchoret hath wroth:

Many USB drivers have a "power save" feature that will kill the power to the wireless device to extend battery life. It's usually on the "properties" page for the wireless device. It also is part of the APM and APCI setting in Windoze and in the computer BIOS. Try disabling most of the power management features and see if it helps.

Remember, though, that ongoing connections still remain good & active. If the device (PCI or USB) had the juice cut to it, I'd lose that, wouldn't I?

Suggestions from other quarters suggest that this may not be a wireless problem at all, but rather a DNS malady.

Color me stumped! 8-(

Anchoret hath wroth:

It might be DNS. Do some testing. Ping all the IP addresses involved starting at your end and moving to the internet.

1. Ping the router IP address. That should work. If not, your wireless link might have a problem.
2. Ping your ISP's gateway by IP address. You can get that by going to your routers "status" page and noting the gateway IP address. That should work. If not, you don't have an internet connection through your broadband link.
3. Ping a well known site by IP address. Try Yahoo at: Pinging
   formatting link
   [66.94.230.44] with 32 bytes of data: That should work or your ISP has a router problem.
4. Finally, ping
   formatting link
   by name. If DNS is working, that should work. If not, you have a DNS problem somewhere.

One possible problem is that your ISP is juggling DNS servers. I've heard of this being done to prevent DoS attacks. If your router doesn't follow the change and points to an "old" DNS server, you will have DNS lookup failures. You might want to note the DNS servers shown on the "status" page of your router before and after failures.

Will do...but it hasn't acted up yet tonight.

With the browser, I can bring up the wireless router at

192.168.1.1, but not the modem at 192.168.0.1 when it's in this weird state, but I haven't actually tried to ping anything from the notebook or router admin functions.

It would SEEM that it would be a router problem then, but it's not:

Note that if I reboot the computer, the problem goes away.

Turning off the wireless card & comm program and restarting them does nothing.

Running ipconfig /flushdns does nothing.

I could be mistaken, but I believe I had this identical problem with the non-networked desktop computer going directly into the DSL modem with an ethernet cable.

Hmmm...

Have you tried changing your router ip to 192.168.0.x (x being any number less than 254, but not 1, as that's the modems ip) to "match" your modems settings? Somebody will explain why this is important.

alien

Anchoret hath wroth:

Sigh. Long term intermittent problems are such fun to deal with. However, we have a computer and it can be taught to do some testing while you're away. Find one of those connectivity monitor programs (I'm too lazy to find one right now) and set it to monitor the various parts of the puzzle (router IP, gateway IP, DNS servers, something on the internet by IP, something on the internet by name). Have it generate a log file. Then go away and see if anything changes during the day or night. If this is too much, I can write a batch file or Perl script that will do the trick. I normally use MRTG with ping-probe to do such things but that might be too much for now.

You should not be able to see the modem from the LAN no matter what IP address or state it's in. Most routers will block all requests for inside IP's that are on the LAN, but routed to the WAN side. You would either need to setup a static route to the IP address of the modem or throw together a weird cabling arrangement which I've posted in the past to be able to monitor a modem through a router. I'll post the reference when I find it.

Test first. Assume later.

Have you considered saving the results of:

1. IPCONFIG /ALL
2. ROUTE PRINT
3. The router status page and comparing what they look like before and afterwards? By rebooting, you're destroying the evidence. I went through a similar exercise with someone. He assured me that the power management was not an issue. IPCONFIG /ALL showed that his wireless was disabled when his connection died. After that, it was an easy fix.

Interesting because that usually causes the Windoze DHCP client to request a new DHCP lease from the router. If the router has a screwed up DHCP server, that could be a problem. Incidentally, one minor version of the DD-WRT firmware for the WRT54G did exactly that. The DHCP daemon would die after about 12 hours. However, that's not the current problem.

All that does is flush the DNS cache. If there are bogus lookup results (not bogus DNS servers) in the cache, that will clear it at the Windoze end. It will not clear a trashed DNS cache in the router.

That would point to your ISP's DNS servers. Who's your ISP so that I can run some diags on what their DNS servers are doing? You might wanna try pointing to some other DNS servers with one of your computers to see if it's DNS. If the one that uses your ISP's DNS servers goes comatose, while the one pointing to some other DNS server still works, then you found the problem. What to do about it will require the involvement of your ISP's support people.

Ohm.....

Give me a name and I'll download it.

Well, I first learned from Yahoo's script-reading customer-service drone in Mumbai (or wherever they are in India) that 192.168.0.1 would always access "the modem," and sure enough, it seems to access something...except when in this mysterious busted condition. The SBC info, test and diagnostic screens are extensive. It may be that "the modem" is not actually the physical device, but merely a remote SBC diagnostic page on their server, downstream. I am not expert enough to know.

I shall the next time this happens.

OK, but to invoke Occam here, if the streaming audio is continuing indefinitely (and long after any buffered audio cache would be exhausted), isn't that conclusive proof that the WiFi is powered- up and working?

Remember, _ongoing_ connections continue, but the new connects aren't possible.

Just out of curiosity, how long does the signal have to be down from the WiFi device in the computer before that happens?

According to 192.168.0.1 ("the modem"):

68.94.156.1 dnsr1.sbcglobal.net 68.94.157.1 dnsr2.sbcglobal.net

But...how would rebooting my computer clear a problem with their DNS servers? Would I be analogously shifting the puppy to a different teat?

Sigh. I gotta do everything? Here's how it's done:

1. Search Google for "free network monitoring software".
2. Find nice list of possible programs at:
   formatting link
   Dig through list and try the first one that looks tolerable. Freeping looks close enough. I like the sound of the "free".
   formatting link
   to download and it demands I register. Yawn.... Ignore the 30 day evaluation message. It appears to be totally free.
3. Fire up Freeping and see if it works. Yep. Looks nice. You might wanna use a longer interval than the default 10 seconds.
4. Elapsed time about 3 minutes. Your turn.

You'll soon be an expert at this rate. You didn't bother to disclose the maker and model of your "modem". Some have IP addresses for configuration and statistics, others do not. However, it doesn't matter. The only way you can access your modem with a web browser (or telnet) is if the router is out of the way and you're connected directly to the modem. That works, but is rather unsafe as you're sure to be attacked by scripted attacks.

Since you've leaked that your ISP is SBC, you probably have an Efficient 5100 or 5100B. How many lights? 4 or 5? There is LOTS in there in the way of diagnostics. However, that doesn't do you any good for anything other than DSL and line issues. It won't show anything at the MAC or IP level. Well, just to insure maximum confusion, if you have the 5100B setup to login with PPPoE, you have yet another layer of troubleshooting. Kindly disarm this "feature" and let the P330W router do the PPPoE login.

I have a 10 minute buffer setup on my streaming audio. It runs all the time in my office. The reason for the long buffer is that SBC likes to drop the line all too often, and we have about 25 computer on one DSL line. Traffic often gets heavy and I don't like to lose my background music. You could have small outages and never notice it with streaming audio. Check the size of your buffer and see if anything gets worse.

Having continuous streaming audio working again points to a DNS problem. An existing connection does not require any DNS support. It just works. However, a new connection, such as a new URL in the web browser requires a DNS lookup. If DNS is mangled in some way, you won't get a connection. Try writing down the IP address of some popular web sites. Use ping to find the IP address. Then, when DNS screws up again, try accessing the web site by IP address instead of the name. If that works, it's definitely a DNS problem.

Also, Windoze 2000 and XP have a nasty feature where failed DNS lookups are cached. In theory, running: ipconfig /displaydns ipconfig /flushdns should clear this, but it doesn't. See:

Probably DNS. However, we don't know if it fails only by domain name, or also by IP address.

Disconnect time varies by client. Some, like Intel Proset are adjustable. If you want roaming between access points, it's about 1-2 seconds. If you want to tolerate fades, interference, and flakey signals, it can be as long as 60 seconds. It's easy enough to test. Just unplug the antenna so that the signal drops to zero and see how long it takes for the client to realize that it has lost the AP.

Oh swell. If those number are in the modem, then you're using the PPPoE dialer in the modem and not in the router. Bad idea. That also means that you're cacheing DNS lookup in BOTH the modem and the P330W. Two points of possible failure.

See: |

| set your system to "PPP is on the computer". This will take some tinkering with the DSL modem and setting up your PPPoE sbcglobal.net login in the Zyxel P330W.

Dunno. If true, then the DNS cache in the computer is the problem, not in the router or modem. However, I'm not 100.0% sure that rebooting isn't causing some buffer or table to flush in the Zyxel when the computer disconnects during a reboot.

Sorry, I thought you had a dozen such programs actively in mind.

For future reference, I downloaded FreePing without all the registration nonsense at this page:

I hope I didn't get a wad of adware in there, but I'll scan later.

I have it pinging those two SBC DNS servers, plus 192.168.0.1 &

192.168.1.1. Anything else I should configure?

If I can use the information often enough to retain it; I'm a geezer.

"Efficient 5100," w/five lights.

I'm confused: OK, I am now in bed accessing the net via my notebook. I can, by going to 192.168.1.1 in Firefox, bring up the ZyXEL wireless router's admin/diagnostic page. By going to

192.168.0.1 in Firefox, I get a similar SBC-Efficient admin/diagnostic page. The only thing (other than the phone line & AC adapter) connected to the modem is the router, via an Etheret cable.

OK, it's the 5100, but I assume it's a similar setup. I think that the modem is logging in w/PPPoE. I changed it and am waiting to see what happens.

Oops. I'm wiped out. In "PPP Location," my choices are "Modem" (default), "Computer" or "Bridged." Modem was default. I changed it to "Computer" and I lost the Internet.

On the router, it looks like in "WAN Port Configuration," I have the options in "WAN Access Type" of "DHCP Client" (default) "PPPoE," "PPTP" and "L2TP."

I'm guessing you want me to get the modem configurexd to "Computer" and the router to "PPPoE," but I'm going to wait until I get this straight...considering I've lost the net until I can resurrect the PPPoE on the modem...OK, back up...

BUT WAIT! In all this monkey motion, I have the problem surfaced again!

OK, I'm in that "stuck" state right now. I cannot reach anything beyond the router with the browser or separate mail client.

Dig: In FreePing, I'm getting good pings on the router, the modem, the two DNS servers and

just for a known site. The only irregularity is that the first DNS server showed a failure which passed. Does this suggest something was corrupted in my computer by this DNS failure? There's no details of the error in FreePing.

I'm guessing this intermittant DNS glich cooks something in XP until reboot. Let me save this and see...

[Later: It cleared...on reboot...wait, wasn't this where I came in?] ~~

Anchoret hath wroth:

My mind cannot hold more than one program at a time.

I posted a list. Again:

Your router's IP address which I guess is 192.168.1.1 I dunno about your modem. Your ISP's gateway IP address. See the status page. Any common server that's on the internet by IP address. Any common server that's on the internet by domain name.

I'm 58 and a crumudgeon.

That's the good one. You win.

Oh, I see. I'm wrong. You're doing double NAT. You have the 5100 modem doing the PPPoE login *AND* doing NAT at 192.168.0.1. Meanwhile, you're router is also doing NAT with 192.168.0.2 (or something similar) on the WAN port, and 192.168.1.1 on the LAN port. This arrangement sucks but will work. However, if you do it my way, and disable the PPPoE and NAT in the modem, converting it back to just a modem, and doing just one NAT in the router, then methinks you'll lose your ability to access the modem through the router. At least that's the way it usually works.

Select "PPP is on the computer". PPP location is "computer". Setup your router for PPPoE on the WAN port. Install your full login (i.e. snipped-for-privacy@sbcglobal.net) and password in the router on the WAN (internet) page. You will probably need to power cycle everything to clear the MAC addresses.

Select PPPoE. Install your full login (i.e. snipped-for-privacy@sbcglobal.net) and password in the router on the WAN (internet) page.

Correct.

Huh?

*BY IP ADDRESS OR DOMAIN NAME* ????? Argh. Please be a bit more specific when you say "cannot reach". What exactly are you trying to reach?

OK, then you should be able to browse the internet. However, the DNS lookup for

may be cached somewhere. Therefore, try a web pile that you've never tried before and is NOT in the cache.

No. The one error was probably while the modem and router were switching modes. Ignore or reset the count.

Sigh. Did you remember to run: IPCONFIG ROUTE PRINT before and after and see if there's a difference?

OK, I'm going to do a synopsis so far to tighten this up a bit:

I changed the defaults concerning PPPoE as directed to have PPP on the router instead of the modem.

As you anticipated, this has made the modem @ 192.168.0.1 inaccessible by the browser and FREEping can no longer successfully ping 192.168.0.1 -- but Internet access is OK. The router can still be accessed @ 192.168.1.1 with the browser. I gather that this was the desired outcome, though I am unclear what advantages this configuration has over the previous one, or if it was expected to clear the strange "stuck" problem with which we started off the thread.

It seems possible to me that it might, but I don't think we went into that yet.

FREEping is configured to ping:

My gateway IP Both DNS Servers by IP My router @ 192.168.1.1 Excite.com by IP

by name

All ping, though there are occasional ping failures of the DNS servers.

Should this be run at all times, or invoked only when the "stuck" condition arises?

To the rest of the message.... =================================================================

Hmm. Perhaps either. I'm not absolutely sure, as I couldn't reach the modem by IP -- yet FREEping was merrily pinging successfully. I realize that reaching a website by IP and my modem by IP are different issues, though...and now see that if there was a DNS problem I could _still_ be expected to access any server by IP rather than name, correct?

But I couldn't.

OK, good idea.

Unfortunately, I was confused about that relative to the FREEpinging business, but I will definitely do it if this "stuck" condition occurs again.

You have given me a couple of things to check for the next time it happens. I will faithfully report back with the results.

Thanks for your help!

Anchoret hath wroth:

Good.

Yep. That's "normal".

You have eliminated the "double NAT" and one possible source of DNS cacheing in the Efficient 5100. Simplification and return to a more "typical" configuraiton. Unfortunately the cause of the problem is still not clearly identified.

The DNS servers tend to be busy and their routers might be throwing away low priority packets such as ICMP ping and such. One or two "no response" failures are not important. It's when it totally quits that worries me.

I'm also not so sure that pinging nasa.gov is going to show anything. The IP address of the nasa.gov server is already in the computers DNS cache and will work even if the DNS servers go down. If it gets stuck again, try adding a different site by name and see if that works or just run: ipconfig /flushdns and see if it can get an IP address via DNS.

Initially, all the time. It generates very very little taffic. That will show what is "normal".

Grrr.... I'm not talking about the modem. I mean were you able to browse a web site by name or by IP address? The difference shows if your system is able to get a valid IP address from a DNS lookup. Try to test with web sites that are NOT in the web browsers cache.

Correct. The problem is that if the computer or router has the web sites IP address in its cache, then the site will show up even if DNS is totally dead. You gotta either flush the cache first, or try a new and different web site.

The main idea behind the ping thing is to figure out where in the chain between the computah and the internet site, the connection is getting lost.

OK, good luck.

[Twisty server is crashed, so I'll resend this -- a duplicate message may show up in a day or two...or not]

OK, here's the followup.

You're going to LOVE this! ======================================================= |>> However, the DNS lookup for

may be cached somewhere. |>> Therefore, try a web pile that you've never tried before and is |>> NOT in the cache. | |> OK, good idea. =======================================================

All right, here's what happened. Stay with me here, because you won't believe it.

I was cruising along, listening to streaming audio and working on e-mail, and I realized I couldn't send my mail. Nor could I access any site with any of the three browsers on the machine, nor could I access the usenet newsserver I use. Everything was locked up solid in terms of NEW Internet connections, though everything had been working flawlessly a few minutes before. Streaming audio went on for at least twenty minutes and I could see it was still downloading data. It was an OLD connection, therefore good.

OK, so I go to FREEping, fire it up and it pings everything (see previous message) with 100% success.

Still no HTTP, POP3, SMTP, NNTP access in the programs, though. Dead.

OK, so I go back to FREEping and think of a site name that I haven't visited in years (per your suggestion). I enter the name and FREEping pings it perfectly with 100% good pings.

I go to the browser and enter the name and I can't reach it. Browser's stone dead. ALL the browsers are stone dead in terms of being able to look up sites. So are three mail clients and newsreaders.

So much for the theory that if you can ping it you can browse it.

========================================================= |> did you remember to run: |> IPCONFIG |> ROUTE PRINT |> before and after and see if there's a difference? ==========================================================

They are 100% identical.

How's this for weird?

-=- This message was sent via two or more anonymous remailing services.

snipped-for-privacy@See.Comment.Header (Anchoret) hath wroth:

I live for entertainment value.

OK, so you have connectivity to the internet. It's not the wireless, the DSL modem, or the ISP.

Argh. That means that DNS is working and you can lookup new domain names. So much for the DNS cache theory. Time for a new theory.

Well, it's not DNS. Next time this happens, instead of FreePing which is a bit tedious, try just pinging *NEW* sites with: Start -> Run -> cmd ping

ping If they return pings, then DNS is working. If they return errors, then DNS is not working. From your previous description, it will probably work. So much for the DNS theory.

Yep. Makes little sense. Previously cached connections that should have worked, such as the mail servers, no longer work. Yet, new connections work just fine for only ping but not for other services. Old connections continue to work. It's not DNS.

I've seen something like this before and it was defective router firmware. Ping would work, but nothing else. It was not exactly the same as it required the router to be rebooted, not the client computer, to return to normal.

Some questions:

1. Do you have any other computers on you LAN available for testing? At this point, I'm still not 100% sure it's not your computer.
2. Can you cure the problem by rebooting the router instead of the computer?
3. Are you using an anonymous browsing service, web accellerator, or anonymous browsing? If you're NOT using a proxy server, make sure that there are no proxy like settings left over from something. In Firefox 1.5, it's: Tools -> Options -> General ->

Connection Settings -> "Direct internet" Also, in IE6, it's: Tools -> Internet Options -> Connections -> LAN Settings -> Uncheck everything If you ARE using a proxy service, web accellerator, or anonymous browsing service, then trashing these settings will break them. Scribble down the setting so you can put them back.

1. Is the Zyxel P-330W firmware the latest?
2. Do you have access to a spare router? Sustitution might be a good way to isolate the culprit.

OK, here's the followup.

You're going to LOVE this! ======================================================= |>> However, the DNS lookup for

may be cached somewhere. |>> Therefore, try a web pile that you've never tried before and is |>> NOT in the cache. | |> OK, good idea. =======================================================

All right, here's what happened. Stay with me here, because you won't believe it.

I was cruising along, listening to streaming audio and working on e-mail, and I realized I couldn't send my mail. Nor could I access any site with any of the three browsers on the machine, nor could I access the usenet newsserver I use. Everything was locked up solid in terms of NEW Internet connections, though everything had been working flawlessly a few minutes before. Streaming audio went on for at least twenty minutes and I could see it was still downloading data. It was an OLD connection, therefore good.

OK, so I go to FREEping, fire it up and it pings everything (see previous message) with 100% success.

Still no HTTP, POP3, SMTP, NNTP access in the programs, though. Dead.

OK, so I go back to FREEping and think of a site name that I haven't visited in years (per your suggestion). I enter the name and FREEping pings it perfectly with 100% good pings.

I go to the browser and enter the name and I can't reach it. Browser's stone dead. ALL the browsers are stone dead in terms of being able to look up sites. So are three mail clients and newsreaders.

So much for the theory that if you can ping it you can browse it.

========================================================= |> did you remember to run: |> IPCONFIG |> ROUTE PRINT |> before and after and see if there's a difference? ==========================================================

They are 100% identical.

How's this for weird?