Really getting frustrated that I can’t find any obvious similar posts to mine on here! For months now I have had issues with intermittent access to other computers within my network; all on wi-fi and 802.11n (both 5G and 2.4G). Eventually I turned off DHCP and used static IPs and all was great. Only problem now is that some of my mobile devices do not support static IPs and expect DHCP to exist on the network. Once I got my new HTC 8x I turned on DCHP as I couldn’t live without it any longer, and now I’m back to my original connectivity issues.
It also seems that occasionaly it will just drop DNS entirely as well (no Google, etc. unless I’ve already been there recently). Other times, just internal connections aren’t possible but external ones are. When it’s just the internal connections, referencing other devices by IP instead of host name does not work either.
What are my options to address this? I just upgraded to the latest (Feb. 20-something release) firmware and still have the issues. I was told over a support request a few months back to restore my router. My fear in doing so is that I may lose my files on the wdrouter share and I simply do not have the time to back them up onto the original computer again given the sheer number of files transferred. As you can guess, I won’t be getting another hybrid device anytime soon! Otherwise I would have tried the suggestion already.
Restoring the router to factory default wont delete your files, you can do it from then dashboard or by pressing the reset button on the bottom side for 10 seconds. Check page 67 of the manual for the steps.
That was one of the biggest questions I had and was afraid to commit to factory reset. I did it over the weekend and set up my 5Ghz and 2.4Ghz again. Still getting intermittent issues when connecting from my laptop to my desktop (can’t find desktop via name or IP). Of course as soon as I load up the device table in the router’s admin console it works great - go figure! I’m curious if my desktop is unavailable until about 10 minutes after it boots. Starting to look like the real pattern here. If that’s the case I’m not sure it’s the router - might be something in Windows.
Marked you for the factory reset information - thanks! Wish me luck with the rest of my issue…
Are you trying to connect to your other LAN Windows computers via their NetBIOS name? Not sure if this is supported on this router. Have you tried turning on the “Enable as Local Master Browser”?
Excellent point about master browser. Once that’s enabled I just need to make sure the router starts before any other devices so that it claims MB status right?
It most likely is using NetBIOS (or whatever Windows 8 and Windows 7 use on a LAN with no domain). When I go to the device table on the router it shows the computer names no problem, and that they have valid IP addresses. But trying to connect from one LAN machine to another via either name or IP just results in not being able to find the destination computer. BUT, sometimes after about 10 minutes or so, it works magically (either by name or IP at that point). So odd!
I really think it might be Windows at that point; but I can’t remember if I had this issue before or after I upgraded my desktop (the remote computer in this case) from W7 to W8. It’s almost like the W8 desktop (remote machine again) doesn’t accept incoming requests on the NIC for a few minutes. Maybe I should even try disabling the firewall.
I’ll most definitely post what I find over the next few days though; and I do think that making the router the master browser is a good idea since it’s the only device that’s expected to have permanent uptime on my network. Perhaps I’ll go so far as to set up a domain controller VM on my desktop and just leave the desktop running 24/7…
