Fir F2000 2.4G Wifi

clintondaly

Howdy,

I've an F2000 with nearly 2 years and never really had any issues however the last few weeks there seems to be an issue with devices connecting to the 2,4G signal.
I usually have about 16 wifi devices connected and then 5 more through LAN through a switch off the LAN 4 1GB port.
There's been a new iphone,ipad and smartwatch(wifi one) come into the house the last few weeks and these seem to be the issue,as they come and go from the house it seems like whichever grabs on to the wifi first when they come back gets connected and the other devices wont connect.

Theoretically the router should handle 200+ devices,however,I have limited the IP range for 100 devices myself,I've reset the router,changed channels,changed bands,changed the lease times for the server as they were at 72 hours and it still seems its the last devices that i try and connect say "unable to join network" 5G is working no problem as are Ethernet connected devices.


Any ideas ?

Tweaky

Unfortunately I'm not of any help here but am having the exact same issues as yourself.
Like yourself we did add new devices over the Christmas - 3 echo dots and a couple of smart plugs and a hive bulb.

I have had the F2000 since June 2017 with no problems. It is only in the past month that this issue developed. 5G no issue whatsoever - all the issues are occurring with the 2.4G

clintondaly

Thanks for the response.
Have you contacted Eir here ?
If not,I can post a question to them here if you then maybe want to jump on the back of it.

Tweaky

No I haven't as I thought it might be just something I had done or was a item in my house that was affecting the Wifi. When I read your post I realised it could be more of a hardware or firmware issue with the Modem.

clintondaly

That's what I'm thinking as I did a full reset of the router and the firmware is at version "50"

clintondaly

Link to Eir query here

https://www.boards.ie/ttfthread/2057943851

ED E

clintondaly wrote: »

Theoretically the router should handle 200+ devices

Not really.

It can DHCP to 253 devices if you really wanted (it would struggle to route that though) but the WLAN interfaces which operate at a lower level are often capped far lower. 32 would be more normal but 16 (1 bit less) would also make sense.

The HG659 is based on a BCM6362 for which the specs aren't readily available but if you found them I'd put money on it being a 1 byte identifier.

clintondaly

ED E wrote: »

Not really.

It can DHCP to 253 devices if you really wanted (it would struggle to route that though) but the WLAN interfaces which operate at a lower level are often capped far lower. 32 would be more normal but 16 (1 bit less) would also make sense.

The HG659 is based on a BCM6362 for which the specs aren't readily available but if you found them I'd put money on it being a 1 byte identifier.

Seems to be an issue in New Zealand too lol

https://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=39&topicid=214828

https://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=40&topicid=189597

On the presumption the HG659 is similar to the F2000 heres the data sheet,can you see anything here with regards the 1 byte identifier ?

https://e.huawei.com/en/material/onLineView?MaterialID=26ee5c08f48d43db84ff8eb84d0862bd

tsue921i8wljb3

Can you give any of the devices static IPs, assuming they are using DHCP at the minute? If it is a DHCP issue it might be a (temporary) workaround.

ED E

Clark Hot Orange wrote: »

Can you give any of the devices static IPs, assuming they are using DHCP at the minute? If it is a DHCP issue it might be a (temporary) workaround.

Its the WLAN hardware addressing scheme, DHCP won't help.

HG659 is similar to the F2000

It IS the 659. I've seen that datasheet but its the short form that wouldnt include such detail.

clintondaly

Ok after spending an hour on chat with technical I got no where, just said my device was wrong even though it can happen any device in the house,I give up.

To try and prove my limit theory I loaded 15 devices onto 2.4 Wifi
I then connected a 16th device and it worked,then tried device 17 and I was met with the "unable to connect to network"
I then disconnected device 15 and tried to connect the device that i had tried to connect as 17 and guess what, it connected.

This is telling me there is a 16 device limit on active WiFi connections over the 2.4 Wifi network

I'm not sure if the DCHP reservation will work but i will give it a go and see

tsue921i8wljb3

clintondaly wrote: »

Ok after spending an hour on chat with technical I got no where, just said my device was wrong even though it can happen any device in the house,I give up.

To try and prove my limit theory I loaded 15 devices onto 2.4 Wifi
I then connected a 16th device and it worked,then tried device 17 and I was met with the "unable to connect to network"
I then disconnected device 15 and tried to connect the device that i had tried to connect as 17 and guess what, it connected.

This is telling me there is a 16 device limit on active WiFi connections over the 2.4 Wifi network

I'm not sure if the DCHP reservation will work but i will give it a go and see

I would not use DHCP reservation but explicitly set a static IP in the device(s) itself outside the DHCP range of the router.

Though if ED E is correct and it is a hardware issue my solution won't work.

clintondaly

Right,I'm after hooking up 2 more devices through a giga-switch and gone to LAN with them and now have the current active number of devices connected to the 2.4 Wifi as 14.
Must now wait till tomorrow evening when there is a few extra devices in the house for a while and will see if they connect.

Tweaky

ED E wrote: »

Its the WLAN hardware addressing scheme, DHCP won't help.

If i add an access point onto my network and add some of my wireless devices to that would it help ?? i have added a lot of smart home devices recently and definitely gone over 16 devices and am running into issues with items not connecting to the router. 5G seems ok at the moment but not as many devices are 5G compatible.

ED E

Tweaky wrote: »

If i add an access point onto my network and add some of my wireless devices to that would it help ?? i have added a lot of smart home devices recently and definitely gone over 16 devices and am running into issues with items not connecting to the router. 5G seems ok at the moment but not as many devices are 5G compatible.

IMO and that of many infosec people, considering the relatively low security of many IOT devices, the ONLY place they should be is on a completely segmented network

With Virgin this is easy, with Eir this should be attainable for FTTH customers by adding a switch between the ONT and routers putting one on IPOE and one on PPPoE so they can both bring up a link simultaneously.

If you've got VDSL you'll be stuck with just adding an extra AP to alleviate the wifi issue.

Marlow

Some routers allow for a DMZ (De-militarized Zone) or Guest network, where both networks hang behind the same outside IP and you can do individual port-forwardings.

The Fritz!Box routers for example can segment LAN4 and a seperate WiFi SSID off for this ... https://en.avm.de/service/fritzbox/fritzbox-7530/knowledge-base/publication/show/949_Setting-up-LAN-guest-access-in-the-FRITZ-Box/

Users in the guest network can not access your normal internal network.

Not sure if the F2000 has those features.

/M

clintondaly

Eir have come back on the thread I posted there stating the F2000 is capable of 5 devices simultaneously and then goes downhill after that,Which wasn't what I asked nor is it the correct answer.
I have politely told them they are now supplying routers which are not fit for purpose and they need to take it seriously or they will start to lose customers.

Link here again to the thread;

https://www.boards.ie/ttfthread/2057943851

clintondaly

Marlow wrote: »

Some routers allow for a DMZ (De-militarized Zone) or Guest network, where both networks hang behind the same outside IP and you can do individual port-forwardings.

The Fritz!Box routers for example can segment LAN4 and a seperate WiFi SSID off for this ... https://en.avm.de/service/fritzbox/fritzbox-7530/knowledge-base/publication/show/949_Setting-up-LAN-guest-access-in-the-FRITZ-Box/

Users in the guest network can not access your normal internal network.

Not sure if the F2000 has those features.

/M

There is a guest network on the F2000 but it only broadcasts on 5G and I have no issues with the 5G network,had checked that but thanks

clintondaly

So,
Having confirmed while ago that there was 14 active wifi connections to the 2.4G wifi I brought in the devices this evening that previously wouldn't connect and both connected and worked fine and then tried to add a new device which would be a 17th connection and got the "unable to join network" message ,this confirms for myself at least that there is a limitation in the F2000 and in my case I hit the max at 16 devices on simultaneous connection.

Eir's official response is 5 devices max and then expect a drop in speeds,but that wasn't event the question I asked them on the other thread and then got fobbed off for a finish.

Eir's broadband support section on their website states 10 devices as max.

The Australian/New Zealand HG569 version has a max of 32 devices.

I guess I now need to get a new router and bridge etc.if i want to bring anything else into the house.

Any suggestions for dual band router that will allow a good amount of connections ?

ED E

FTTH or no? If yes, what speed?

clintondaly

ED E wrote: »

FTTH or no? If yes, what speed?

Well I have fiber till it hits my phone line lol
I'M about 30 meters from the Fiber Cabinet on my street,paying for 100Mb and getting 96-97Mb on nvidia shield on Ethernet through gigabit switch so I'm getting what I pay for.
I'm signed up for the SIRO roll out whenever it happens here so want to be ready for that too I suppose

Tweaky

@clintondaly - are any of your devices Amazon echos or Kindle Fires - mine were taking a lot of slots on the 2.4G band but after doing a bit of research if you turn off the auto channel for 5G and fix it at 36 or 40 or 44 or 48 the Amazon devices can all see 5G and connect. They have difficulty with the AC range of channels.

It has solved my 2.4G issue for a while - I assume 5G is also 16 devices - don't have enough devices to test it

clintondaly

Tweaky wrote: »

@clintondaly - are any of your devices Amazon echos or Kindle Fires - mine were taking a lot of slots on the 2.4G band but after doing a bit of research if you turn off the auto channel for 5G and fix it at 36 or 40 or 44 or 48 the Amazon devices can all see 5G and connect. They have difficulty with the AC range of channels.

It has solved my 2.4G issue for a while - I assume 5G is also 16 devices - don't have enough devices to test it

I have 5 echos around the place
I just tried that with one of them and set the 5G channel to 44 and was able to connect the Alexa to it,I had always assumed they were 2.4 only.

A sincere thank you

Tweaky

clintondaly wrote: »

I have 5 echos around the place
I just tried that with one of them and set the 5G channel to 44 and was able to connect the Alexa to it,I had always assumed they were 2.4 only.

A sincere thank you

No problem I knew they had 5G but could never work out why the network was sometimes not visible. The fixed channel should sort it hopefully.

ED E

Tweaky wrote: »

No problem I knew they had 5G but could never work out why the network was sometimes not visible. The fixed channel should sort it hopefully.

Its a quirk or EU / US spectrum rules. They can only attempt to use higher channels if they're willing to test and reduce power so they dont screw with Air Traffic Control and Weather systems. If Amazon dont bother to include TPC/DFS then the Alexa can't "see" those channels.