Genius router & Wifi -> Ethernet partitioning

Forums › 2degrees (including Slingshot, Orcon, Flip, Stuff Fibre, MyRepublic, 2talk and Vocus) › Genius router & Wifi -> Ethernet partitioning

jamesrt

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#150662 29-Jul-2014 21:16

Hi,

I'm not the only person seeing issues with Wifi based devices connecting to the Orcon routers (both older Black "bob" & newer White NetComm) being unable to communicate with wired Ethernet devices:

1. http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=66&topicid=141327
2. http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=82&topicid=133828
3. http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=82&topicid=129112

and potentially (reading between the lines)

4. http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=66&topicid=146579

In my case, they definitely work for a while after power-cycling the router, but stop working after a period (undefined). When my Wifi-connected devices can't access Ethernet connected devices, it seems to be a "layer 2" issue, as ARP requests don't get satisfied, so the devices literally can't find each other across the router's different media interfaces. Devices involved are a TPLink Router, Synology NAS, Apple Macbook Pro, iPhone, Android Phone, and Windows laptop; so that's a fairly broad spectrum of devices - unlikely to indicate a single vendor-related issue (in my opinion, at any rate!)

I'm not too bothered as I've setup my home network with alternative WiFi access points, so things do more-or-less work as expected; but it would be nice to know if:

a) anyone's actually looking into this on the Orcon and/or device-manufacturer side of things, and/or
b) come up with any theories as to what's actually going on....

I know it "just works" for some people, and it clearly doesn't for others.

Odd.

Very odd.

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#1098306 30-Jul-2014 07:31

It certainly is an odd one. I've had my black Genius for nearly 2 yrs, now, and it has failed with this one once, only.

FireEngine

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#1098310 30-Jul-2014 07:45

Your 3rd example was user setup of his Raspberry Pi.

No we are not tracking any pervasive issue, even re-reading these examples it seems to only occur on users with more complex LAN setups. In some cases it is resolved by a factory reset etc but on the whole it boils down to 1-2 potential examples out of the entire installed base. So frankly no, no-one is working on it or even has any repeatable examples to be able to troubleshoot, let alone present to the manufacturer firmware team to fix.

Regards FireEngine

jamesrt

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#1098342 30-Jul-2014 08:52

FireEngine: No we are not tracking any pervasive issue, even re-reading these examples it seems to only occur on users with more complex LAN setups. In some cases it is resolved by a factory reset etc but on the whole it boils down to 1-2 potential examples out of the entire installed base.

Yeah, clearly it's not a big problem, otherwise there would be more noise about it

FireEngine: So frankly no, no-one is working on it or even has any repeatable examples to be able to troubleshoot, let alone present to the manufacturer firmware team to fix.

That's absolutely fine, my comment wasn't intended to imply any form of criticism or complaint about Orcon staff or processes; it was more a case of curiosity.

Having said that, I'm intrigued enough with the problem myself to try and do some debugging/investigations into it; if I come up with any useful (and hopefully reproducible !) information, I'll let Orcon know...

linw

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#1098350 30-Jul-2014 09:04

Agree - it is just not consistent enough to be worth Orcon looking at it. Just reproducing it would be fun!! Good luck, James.

Cheers.

FireEngine

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#1098470 30-Jul-2014 11:09

jamesrt: my comment wasn't intended to imply any form of criticism or complaint about Orcon staff or processes; it was more a case of curiosity.

No that is fine, I'm just frustrated when we can't fix something because of this kind of reason...

Regards FireEngine

jamesrt

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#1098915 30-Jul-2014 22:57

jamesrt: ... try and do some debugging/investigations into it; if I come up with any useful (and hopefully reproducible !) information, I'll let Orcon know...

Interesting! I've had a bit of a fiddle tonight, and it seems that there is an MAC-table timeout issue in the switching and/or bridging code (which doesn't really surprise me that much, it's pretty much what I expected to find).

I turned the WiFi on my laptop off (after deleting the remembered AP details), and left it for a hour or so. I then reconnected it to the Orcon router WiFi, and pinging the ethernet-connected devices works fine. Whilst a ping session ran in a background window, I then dropped that WiFi connection and established a new one to my 2nd access point (it's 5GHz, not that it should really matter, and more importantly a different SSID). The ping session lost a couple of packets (well duh...), but then carried on fine. Then I reconnected back to the original (orcon router hosted) WiFi SSID, and the background pings immediately started timing out, with the occasional "ping: sendto: No route to host" message thrown in. (This is what I normally see). A little over 5 minutes later, however, those pings suddenly sprang back into life, with good response times, and all happy. To be honest, I'm not normally that patient, and have given up by then!

So, the theory I have at this point is that the MAC table in the router's internal switch/bridge isn't being updated correctly when a device transitions between WiFi and wired ethernet connections. Clearly the transition from WiFi connection to Ethernet is fine; but once a MAC address is known to be on a given ethernet port in the built-in 4port switch, I'm assuming the switching/bridging code inside the router keeps sending the packets for that MAC back to the ethernet switch even if the destination MAC appears back on the WiFi side of the bridge. There's probably a couple of different timeout states in the MAC tables, and once the MAC has timed-out from the 4-port ethernet switch, the switch/bridge then starts directing the traffic for that MAC back out the WiFi side of the bridge (if that's where it is located). Or something similar - the mechanics I've described aren't entirely accurate (I'm not a network engineer, I'm a Unix engineer), but hopefully you've got the point I was hoping to put across....

I'd appreciate it if someone else with an appropriate setup could attempt to reproduce this behaviour.

Thanks!

Jase2985

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#1278175 7-Apr-2015 09:46

Old thread i know but im having the same issue with the newer NF8AC

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=66&topicid=171107

Did you any up finding a solution to this?

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jamesrt

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#1278176 7-Apr-2015 09:53

Hi,

Yeah, seen your other posts on the related topics too.

Unfortunately, I don't have a magic solution for you; in my case, I've turned off the WiFi on my Orcon router, and am using the WiFi supplied by my Truenet probe (which is very convenient - thanks, John/TrueNet!). (As that's using an Ethernet port on the Orcon, I don't see the issue any more).

I know a couple of the Orcon guys seemed interested in following this up in the past, but I've not had any contact with either of them for some time...

Jase2985

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#1278178 7-Apr-2015 09:59

Thats a shame

i brought the NF8AC as i wanted the ability to go to UFB, and to have a 5ghz radio with AC.

may have to return it as its not fit for purpose.

linw

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#1278491 7-Apr-2015 16:43

Well, my black Genius Lite is consistent. Using the genius wifi both my android devices, and a windows netbook comp, can only see themselves and the genius. Pings to other ethernet connected devices get 'Destination host unreachable'. Restarting the genius has no effect. Loading factory settings makes no difference, either. It has been like this for a long time.

If I connect to my other AP, all my devices show up and are reachable. This AP connects to the genius via a switch that also connects other networked wired machines.

Long and short, there is no network connection between the genius wifi and the wired side.

linw

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#1280193 10-Apr-2015 09:08

Follow up:- the Netbook quoted above runs win 8.1. Just tried a laptop running Vista and it has no problem accessing all shares from either wireless AP! So, clearly, the Genius is not fundamentally flawed but there is a problem with accessing shares from an 8.1 and android device connected wirelessly.

Anyone got any ideas how to test for the real problem, here?

Note - This, luckily, is not a major in my setup as I don't need wifi sharing from the Genius. But I am curious as to the actual problem.

Jase2985

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#1285716 16-Apr-2015 16:33

just on this, Linw and jamesrt, what device were you using as the access point? im just in conversation with Netcomm and they have done testing with the NF8AC connected to a NB604N and cant seem to replicate the issue, but i think its to do with the talking to another manufactures device rather than their own

if anyone else has had this issue it would be good to know what device you had connected as the access point.

jamesrt

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#1285863 16-Apr-2015 21:22

Jase2985: just on this, Linw and jamesrt, what device were you using as the access point? im just in conversation with Netcomm and they have done testing with the NF8AC connected to a NB604N and cant seem to replicate the issue, but i think its to do with the talking to another manufactures device rather than their own

if anyone else has had this issue it would be good to know what device you had connected as the access point.

TP-Link TL-WDR4900, Firmware version 3.14.7 Build 130424 Rel.72646n

linw

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#1285911 16-Apr-2015 22:38

Using the TPLink 1043ND wireless link, all my wifi devices can see everything.

Using the wireless link on the black Genius, the problem devices can see other wireless devices on the Genius, can't see wireless devices on the 1043ND, and none of the LAN cabled devices.

This behaviour is totally repeatable.

Jase2985

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#1285965 17-Apr-2015 07:48

engenius ESR1221N2 300Mbps 802.11b/g/n Wireless N Router
TP-LINK TL-WR841ND 300Mbps 802.11b/g/n Wireless N Router

i tried with those 2 yesterday that i borrowed off my brother in law, no luck same issues

Does anyone have a NF4V or a genius i could borrow for a few days for testing?

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