Intermittent Internet appears to affect some devices only

[freemanator]

Howdy OCUK.

I am trying to work out what I should do to upgrade my networking set up to better understand and ultimately to reduce instability

First the background.

I currently have fibre to the premises in SW London provided by Community fibre. This goes into their modem, which is connected to an Asus RTAX86U which I've cabled to the older Asus RTAC86U router in the loft for a wired backbone for a Mesh setup.


I'm running the stock Asus firmware and have just updated. I've used the simple option to prioritise work for the router settings.

My wife gets cut outs on her work laptop, often very short but they break her VP connection and she loses all her progress. She says she notices it on other devices, so it may not be limited.

We have 6 Google smart displays/speakers on the same network, and they do occasionally drop in and out too. There are a few other smart devices as well, vacuum, thermostat, smoke detectors, oven etc.

Now to the questions

I can see router uptime if I log in via the Web to it, but not Internet uptime. How could I check how long the connection has been up, and/or track packet loss?

Should I move the smart devices to a separate network? If so I would presumably need to have my phone on the same network to cast to them. Would it be best to just have a separate network for work devices, and is that likely to solve the problem, or would it require separate hardware to make a difference?

Anything else I can do?

Thanks for the help

 

[GregI]

Asus RTAX86U which I've cabled to the older Asus RTAC86U

You found your problem right there.

Asus routers also have a tendency to just randomly switch broadcasting channels and not advertise it properly so that's probably causing your issues, try and set fixed channels e.g Channel 6 on 2.4 and 36 on 5 Ghz. The actual internet will likely be fine.

wired backbone for a Mesh setup

Being pedantic here but what you have is not a mesh. Mesh is defined by the 802.11s standard where nodes talk to each other wirelessly and no wired links between devices exist. What you have is just a wired access point with (if Asus set it up correctly... probably not) 802.11r fast roaming.

track packet loss?

Not the best idea but just set up a graph at thinkbroadband (account needed): https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality

Any packet loss will show as red at the very top of the graph.

 

[freemanator]

You found your problem right there.

Asus routers also have a tendency to just randomly switch broadcasting channels and not advertise it properly so that's probably causing your issues, try and set fixed channels e.g Channel 6 on 2.4 and 36 on 5 Ghz. The actual internet will likely be fine.

Being pedantic here but what you have is not a mesh. Mesh is defined by the 802.11s standard where nodes talk to each other wirelessly and no wired links between devices exist. What you have is just a wired access point with (if Asus set it up correctly... probably not) 802.11r fast roaming.


Not the best idea but just set up a graph at thinkbroadband (account needed): https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality

Any packet loss will show as red at the very top of the graph.

Thanks Gregl.

I've tried the fixed channels and hopefully that will solve it. Also set up the tracker, it was based off of something I read saying that rather than the Internet dropping out, it could be extra package loss, and wanted to cover all my bases.

And thanks for correction on mesh, I'd meant to look up the Asus branding, as they call it AIMesh when you connect the routers together, however done.

I'll post an update if the problem is still happening or if I remember to confirm it has been resolved I a week or so.