I’m getting close to setting up my new laptop to how I like it.
However, the WiFi is bugging me as it effectively disconnects and reconnects very often, sometime remaining connected for 40 seconds. The user experience is fine, you’d never know this is occurring to operate the laptop, view You Tube videos etc.
I have of course fiddled with many settings, even restarting Windows as I wondered if although I’d changed the device properties, nothing would be auctioned until I reset things. Allowing the computer to turn off the device seemed like the jackpot, but it makes no difference.
I am reasonably convinced it is not a driver issue as it did it when first turned on, running Windows 8.0 and since then, it has updated the drivers to the latest version and the laptop is now running Windows 8.1. To my mind, something is telling it to act this way, perhaps in the interests of either laptop battery life, or bandwidth as Windows 8 does seem a bit concerned about both.
While I could well answer, “tried it already to no avail” any ideas? I needed the log when I had broadband faults, but this renders it almost useless.
Laptop is a Sony Vaio and the onboard WiFi is a Broadcom BCM43142
|
What wifi router are you using? Sounds like there might be a compatibility issue with that and the Broadcom WiFi chipset. Changing security on the router might help.
Temporarily try the router without any security would be a suggestion. If you put it back to the previous setting, other clients will automatically reconnect. Setting up a new router with the same SSID and security means you can even swap a router without reconfiguring clients.
|
Netgear DGN 2200 router.
I really do not want to change the security as it's on the highest setting, my old laptop uses it without a problem, and so does my PVR. I'll take the suggestion under advisement, but I'm going to think a bit before I act.
Router was new in perhaps March.
|
I don't think it can be an incompatibility since stuff works.
If it doesn't impact the user experience how do you know its happening? Where is it being detected and does it give any more information.
I'm also curious as to why it matters?
|
Easy answers!
I knew it was happening as I set the router to email me when the log was full. In the past, it went for over a month between logs. When I powered up the laptop and connected, I had three emails with log entries the same day! Subsequently I turned the emails off but have been periodically looking as I experiment.
If you have as I did some months back, connection problems, a good log is a handy tool when you get the ISP engineers out.
|
I assume that you've done the obvious and checked everything that has changed since this has started happening, even if seemingly unrelated?
Anything interesting or relevant in the System Event logs?
|
Only thing that has changed is the addition of the laptop. Router, and the pc it is connected to via an ethernet lead is unchanged.
System Event logs? What logs? The router one are full of junk, and searching Windows control panel for 'system event' gives nothing! A google suggests it still exists, but a screen shot of somebody elses PC suggests I wouldn't know what it was talking about!
|
The reference is to the Windows event logs. I don't have access to a Windows 8.x machine (thankfully) so can't say how you open them up on that. In Windows 7 there's a few ways to get there including:
- Open Event Viewer by clicking the Start button, clicking Control Panel, clicking System and Maintenance, clicking Administrative Tools, and then double-clicking Event Viewer. Administrator permission required If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.
or
- Click the Start button. In the Search box, type Event Viewer, and then, in the list of results, double-click Event Viewer.
or
- Right click on Computer and select Manage... these all used to be MMC plugin based views of the same thing.
I'm sure there'll be a way to get there via the Windows 8 charms bar on the right.
Last edited by: rtj70 on Thu 24 Oct 13 at 18:17
|
I reckon in Windows 8 it's called event viewer but as I suspected, I've not a clue what is going on, user friendly it's not.
Basic Windows policy to periodically rename things to stop folk knowing what they are doing.
|
>> I've not a clue what is going on, user friendly it's not.
In which case a few options:
- Get an iPad
- Get a laptop running a better operating system than Windows 8.1 - e.g. a Macbook
- Get someone in to fix this
or... live with the inconvenience. If you want help sorting this you need to have a bit of a clue :-)
|
1 No - I don't like touch screens, they get filthy
2 They're roughly twice the price
3 I refuse to be beaten
At the end of the day, it's not a big issue, but an annoyance. I'll keep trying but most of my experience suggests the hard part is asking the right question. Google generally comes up with the right answer, but not if one asks the wrong question - and so far, I must have!
|
Might be worth using inSSIDer to see what's happening to the signal:
www.metageek.net/products/inssider/
|
>> Might be worth using inSSIDer to see what's happening to the signal:
(just click on the NETWORKS tab)
|
No need!
Signal strength is huge - I'm under the aerial, and with the previous laptop, it still worked fine next door! I take my laptop round there for some issues and it is handy to just connect as normal.
The router chooses the most empty channels automatically as a default. You can specify, but what's the point of buying a dog and barking yourself! The DGN2200 is not the most specified router Netgear do, but it's got a heck of a lot compared to the types ISPs give away. On the whole, I think it was a very good buy, and I do use several of the advanced features.
|
|
Do you know that the Laptop is dropping the router rather than the other way around?
|
>> The router chooses the most empty channels automatically as a default. You can specify, but
>> what's the point of buying a dog and barking yourself!
The channel that might be most appropriate at this moment in time might not be later, e.g. someone that turns their router on/off when not in use. Perhaps part of the problem is the router reconfiguring channel and then the laptop connection doesn't reconnect without problems?
I'd use an app to find the channel not in use in your area and manually set it to that. If you have a smartphone then something like WiFi Analyzer on Android is very useful to see the wifi channels in use, signal strength, etc.
|
Have wait until Sunday, but my brother has a phone with WiFi, so I'll give him the password and we'll see what his phone makes of the issue. And look at the log with the main PC and laptop off. That should show it up.
Pretty sure the router does not alter channels on the fly, and when I used the nearly dead laptop in safe mode, that connects just fine. I may repeat the exercise, but so far, waiting until Sunday and connecting with another new device holds some attraction.
The new laptop though spent most of Monday on top of the router - less than 3 feet from the aerial busily connecting and reconnecting, so if the channel choice was flawed, even if I was using the same channel as my neighbour, the signal strength of my router should be oodles, a technical term :o), more.
The reason the laptop was sited near the router was because I was setting up the laptop, and use of the big PC for googling stuff was very useful when I hit a snag. I'd hate to set up a PC without another as a tool now!
|
|
Interesting read, but my suspicion is the transmit power is a red herring as it was still a problem three feet away from the aerial!
|
Woo hoo!
Looks like I've fixed it!
The clue that got me started was the fact the laptop said it was continuously connected, ie an hour and a bit on last nights session. So what looked to me like a router disconnect wasn't.
The log is set to be only router operations, so I'd assumed everything was, obviously not.
I googled an edited version of the log entry and it said it was a universal plug and play event. And that led me to the term, 'network discovery' which was turned on in the advanced settings in the control panel of the laptop. So I turned it off.
I can still access the internet on it, the log looks nice and clean so and I've cleared the log of the dross and bravely re-enabled the email service!
Phew!
|
Drat - not fixed, it was pretending!
Issue is definitely universal plug and play. Doubt the router should be logging it, but I can't see it anywhere. If I turn it off in the router, the laptop can't connect.
I've turned off most of the laptop network discovery options, as Mr Gates, it is my PC not yours.
I'm fiddling with the router settings but so far, the only way that turns off the logging of these events also turns off the stuff I do want to log.
I am however a bit closer to the problem but I'm beginning to suspect, there is no real answer as there aren't that many things I can play with, with the router.
|
What is showing in Windows Event Viewer - or have I missed you posting what you've found there?
UPnP for networking is usually used to negotiate Internet connectivity for apps so you don't have to worry about port forwarding. What have you got on the laptop that is making use of UPnP?
|
I don't understand the huge long list of events in Windows event viewer, so I left it. I was not even sure the sorting was by time of occurrence!
I get the feeling my UPnP gripes are very rare, but a heck of a lot of settings for network discovery are quite different to Vista, and the default for Widows 8 seems to be to share everything. I've turned most of that off, and that was what I thought fixed the issue.
I can turn off UPnP broadcasts by the router, but that stops the laptop getting access, so I quickly re-enabled it.
My suspicion is my problem is a function of Windows 8 and really, the router log ought to let one turn off UPnP event logging rather than lumping it in with basic router operations, ie start, get time etc. At the moment, the only way I can see of doing this is to leave the log blank. But of course, I want to see all basic connections so that is no good.
My feeling is, if I could hack the routers software, spotting the bit that logs UPnP events and disabling it would not be hard.
Answer to your last question, nothing I know of is using UPnP, but I guess a sneaky bit is.
Last edited by: Slidingpillar on Fri 25 Oct 13 at 15:36
|
|
so in effect we have 22 entries on a thread for a problem that does not exist?
|
It exists, I can see it!
The more I google, UPnP seems to be a bad thing and a route to piracy and virus risks. It's listed as a service in the control panel (found by searching for services in control panel), so I could turn it off. But not now, I'm going to ponder and sleep on it as I need to be very alert to things stopping working and be able to restart if needed.
|
>> It exists, I can see it!
>>
>> The more I google, UPnP seems to be a bad thing and a route to
>> piracy and virus risks. It's listed as a service in the control panel (found by
>> searching for services in control panel), so I could turn it off. But not now,
>> I'm going to ponder and sleep on it as I need to be very alert
>> to things stopping working and be able to restart if needed.
As far I can see, you had no problem - it was connecting to the net was it?
Seems to me you are in computer hypochondriac mode.
|
So I take it from the latest updates, the laptop is not dropping off the network and losing access to the Internet. It is creating some entries in the log file on the router and may be related to UPnP... If that is the case, there is no problem. But you want to have a different level of logging that provided by the router.
A solution might be a new router. Or if it is running on hardware that will accept the WRT-DD software, you could always go the open source route. WRT-DD is very good. I have it running on an old Linksys router as a spare.
|
You are right in that the new laptop is not actually disconnecting, although that was the impression I got from reading the multitudinous log entries.
The router was new in March and perusing adverts, is still current. So I'm not buying yet another. It looks like I can turn off UPnP in the laptop, and turn it back on if it turns out not to work, or block internet use. If I turn off the broadcast of UPnP from the router that, does stop it connecting? but the other question is, if I stop the laptop using the service, does it carry on working, and can I turn off and turn on, reconnecting as normal. Think the only way I'll find out is to do it, and make sure I'm methodical and cover all bases.
My router does not support WRT-DD, or at least that is what the website says. Just had 5 minutes of 'fun' as I discovered the router software was not the latest version, so I updated it and it doesn't make any difference although a UPnP security issue was address - apparently.
Don't think I get any new things to fiddle with, but I'll have a good look before making any changes to anything.
Last edited by: Slidingpillar on Fri 25 Oct 13 at 20:17
|
|
I'm a little confused, what problem are you trying to solve? Just the size and/or appearance of the log files?
|
Yup, it's the size of the files. The log is a couple of pages of closely typed A4 and it was filling in a bit over a month. With the new laptop in operation, more than three fills per day and rendering genuine interesting events all but hidden in the dross.
A search tonight suggests I can turn it off, but I know that if I turn it off in the router and leave the PC looking, internet access fails.
We'll see, I'm not rushing into anything.
|
So you came on saying you had an Internet access problem and we were ready to help you if you did some checks etc. But what you have is a problem with the logs on the router filling up? And a lot more events being logged in the logs which stops you seeing what you wanted to see in the logs.
My first question is what are you looking out for in the logs that you think are of interest - paranoid or checking up on someone in the house using WiFi? I'll email your other half as I hacked into your PC earlier and know your email - joking but you seem a bit paranoid.
I'd let it run as is and forget about the logs and use them to diagnose real problems.
Sounds like you want to logging to work differently and it doesn't. So leave it on and it fills up with logged event you don't want to know about.
|
To keep it short as no-one is getting any value from this now.
I thought I had an access problem - turns out I don't.
Logs are useful if there is a line or wireless problem, and the current filling up renders them not so. Almost impossible to use them to diagnose a real problem as they are full of dross.
I'm single, and can see the IP address of anyone using my WiFi. Which is four devices of mine, and when he is here, my brother as I've given him access details.
I'll have one more go at things this afternoon as received wisdom from elsewhere, including the FBI says UPnP should be turned off as it's a security risk. Windows 8 enables it as a default.
Last edited by: Slidingpillar on Sat 26 Oct 13 at 08:45
|
Closing post I think.
I've done it for two reasons, someone might be interested, and I found quite a few tales on the internet that could well be the same thing happening, but real answers are thin on the ground.
This afternoon. I turned off the UPnP service (control panel - services) and I think nothing happened, but when I restarted the laptop, so was the UPnP service.
But there was an update lurking for the Broadcom card (labelled Bluetooth, but it also does the WiFi). So I let that go ahead, restarted the laptop and for half an hour, nothing appeared in my log. So much so I eventually did a router reset to get some believable events to show in the log.
Then I did a few other things elsewhere and the laptop slept. When it awoke, it was back to its old tricks of generating a log message every 30 seconds. It may be that with the new driver, the tricks don't start until the computer has a sleep cycle but it's not very helpful and I carried on.
I did some more research on the router message and found the SSDP service was also a quoted player. So I turned this off too and so far the offending log messages have dried up, and interestingly, it also turned off the UPnP service - for keeps this time. So far, I've restarted the laptop twice, and made it sleep twice after the second turn on. The laptop has now been running for over 4 hours and all my log shows are the 4 real WiFi events. Touch wood, I think that fixes the problem as I don't normally log the WiFi connections but did so to get the log traffic up.
The advice on many fora is to turn off network discovery, but as this thread indicates, it doesn't work for my situation, and perhaps others too. Search for services in the control panel, locate the SSDP service, and try turning it off.
I'm now back to a usable router log.
|
|
Did a Windows update, and now it makes SSDP re-enabled when you restart, so the logs fill up again. I'll say no more, other than "thanks Microsoft, that's really helpful".
|
if only "edit post" was available longer!
SSDP - right click, get properties, and disable the service. It's a valid option (for now...) and the service stays off. and that really is my last word, I'm putting the laptop to bed.
|
Laptop WiFi - rtj70
