Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

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nognielsen
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Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#1

Post by nognielsen »

Sorry this is long, but I'm at my wits end and could use another opinion or idea....

I have a newer building which is wired for cat 5 (just a meeting house, not a stake center) It has ATT DSL 10 down. The current set up is as follows. I have an 881w in the attic connected to the ATT DSL modem, and then from the 881w I go to a 16 port switch, and all the of the clerks offices and wall cat5 jacks are plugged into the switch. Then in the clerks offices themselves I have simple netgear routers that get an ip from the 881w and then DHCP wireless to each side of the building. Clerks computers are plugged into the netgear wireless routers in each respective office.

For the last 6 months we've been having the strangest connectivity problems where wireless on from the netgears show no connectivity (you can connect of course and are served up a 192 address but it has no connection out to the internet through the 881w.) However if we unplug the wireless router from the clerks office port and plug the clerks computer directly in to the wall via cat5, we immediately get a working address from the 881w. Strange... Then if I plug the wireless router back into the network the way it was, all works fine for some undetermined amount of time. I thought for sure it was the wireless routers, so I replaced them with other models (same I have in other buildings with a similar setup). Same thing happened.

Then I hear a clerk's computer normally always plugged into the wall was having connectivity issues. Would just drop network connectivity during a transmit on mLS, and then would not get an IP. So this made me think it was an ISP issue or 881w issue. We've had wireless issues at the 881w before, so church HQ had me go ahead and have FM replace the 881w as it was fairly old and out of warranty. I thought it was the last straw and that would fix the problem, but now I hear today that its doing it again!!!! Today the clerks had to plug their computers directly into the wall and it fixed it for the time being. Plus I heard the clerk directly plugged in all the time had the same issues as well.

Any other advice? Could it be the switch? Maybe an ISP issue? Seems to only happen on Sunday. I think what I'm going to do next is totally remove the 881w for one week and see if that helps (Church HQ blessed this idea)
russellhltn
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#2

Post by russellhltn »

nognielsen wrote:Then in the clerks offices themselves I have simple netgear routers
Routers behind the 881? That's not the best idea. I'd suggest you ask FM to get you a pair of switches and 1041s to replace that. That way everything is getting it's IP direct from the 881.

I'm not sure what's wrong, but it sounds like the 881 isn't playing well with the routers. Perhaps it's the unusually short lease time the 881 gives out (a half hour). Can't remember when that was changed, but it might have been around 6 months ago.
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nognielsen
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#3

Post by nognielsen »

russellhltn wrote:
nognielsen wrote:Then in the clerks offices themselves I have simple netgear routers
Routers behind the 881? That's not the best idea. I'd suggest you ask FM to get you a pair of switches and 1041s to replace that. That way everything is getting it's IP direct from the 881.

I'm not sure what's wrong, but it sounds like the 881 isn't playing well with the routers. Perhaps it's the unusually short lease time the 881 gives out (a half hour). Can't remember when that was changed, but it might have been around 6 months ago.

I thought the same thing, but i do have one clerk's computer plugging directly into the wall which goes to the switch which goes directly to the 881w (no consumer router) and it has regular connection issues as well... Even with the new 881w. Maybe thes witch is faulty? (eventhough its a enterprise grade 16 port switch.)

Maybe setting static IPs might help? (I've done this before I believe with no help, but I'll try anything again at this point.)
russellhltn
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#4

Post by russellhltn »

nognielsen wrote:I thought the same thing, but i do have one clerk's computer plugging directly into the wall which goes to the switch which goes directly to the 881w (no consumer router) and it has regular connection issues as well... Even with the new 881w. Maybe thes witch is faulty? (eventhough its a enterprise grade 16 port switch.)
I assume the 881 is connected to the router's "internet" side. Otherwise you may end up with a rouge DHCP causing problems.

When you say "connection issues" what kinds? What are the symptoms? When you do a ipconfig during the problem, what IP does it get? I'd like to focus on this issue first since it seems simpler, but I want to make sure it's not a different problem with the same end result.
nognielsen wrote:Maybe setting static IPs might help? (I've done this before I believe with no help, but I'll try anything again at this point.)
Might not be a bad idea.

You said the 881W is in the attic. How hot does it get up there? You might want to find a thermometer that has min/max readings. Might be worth checking the power quality as well. Make sure something isn't causing the 881 to reboot, resetting it's DHCP, and causing duplicate IPs.
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Mikerowaved
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#5

Post by Mikerowaved »

You might want to review a thread from earlier this year called Additional Access Point, particularly from about post #9 or 10 to the end, to see if it would help you better configure the routers in your clerk's offices.
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kd7mha
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#6

Post by kd7mha »

I would disable the dhcp server on the netgear routers then plug the cable from the wan port into a lan port, (this will allow all connecting clients wired and wireless to get an ip from the 881) then I would give all of the administrative computers static addresses from the static pool on the 881.
nognielsen
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#7

Post by nognielsen »

Update

Okay... I think i've fixed my problem, thanks to you all!

I removed the routers from the clerks office wiring the clerks computers directly to the wall and setting them to static ips on the 881w. This seemed to fix the intermittent connectivity problems they were having. Then I ran about 150 feet of cable in the attic down each side of the building and plugged in the wireless routers there (from the 881w and set dhcp off and gave them static ips named the SSID LDSAccess and gave them different wireless channels 6 and 11. Seemed to work great.... Hopefully this trend will continue. Still baffling that I have my previous set up in another building and it has worked great for years with no problem. Only difference is that building has Uverse internet and not plain DSL like this one.

Thanks for the help y'all!
drepouille
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#8

Post by drepouille »

Why use routers when you can use Cisco 1041n wireless access points? I have heard the 1041n WAPs automatically sense each other, and adjust their channels and signal strength so they don't conflict with one another.

The other advantage of using the 1041n is you can use power injectors to send power as well as signal down a single cable. With routers, you need to find a power source.
Dana Repouille, Plattsmouth, Nebraska
russellhltn
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#9

Post by russellhltn »

drepouille wrote:I have heard the 1041n WAPs automatically sense each other, and adjust their channels and signal strength so they don't conflict with one another.
Kinda, sorta.

They're church standard, which may be most important for long-term support.
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ldsrussp
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Re: Church internet connectivity woes (possible 881w issue)

#10

Post by ldsrussp »

Yeah, I've been told that too about the 1041's but they DON"T sense each other and avoid conflicts, at least not in our buildings. The are plugged directly into the Cisco firewall too (ie: no switch in the way) and I've even reset them and had them reprogram themselves while connected directly to the firewall and they STILL come up on the same channels and conflict with each other. IMO they are junk and a product of a company who has outsourced all engineering and this is the kind of product you now get from them. :(

Very unhappy as I get tons of complaints about the flakiness of the wireless in these buildings but about all I'm allowed to do anymore is power cycle and replace the equipment as it's all controlled by Salt Lake (not that I'm complaining about the idea of that, just wish they had better answers for me). My opinion is the Cisco equipment should all be swapped out for something reliable but I know that's not happening.
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