nocturnal disconnection

For several months my internet has been dropping at night, virtually every night, maybe once or twice sometimes more each night. No fault lights show up on the router (Netgear DGND3700v2). A reboot of the router invariably re-establishes internet connection, but the connection never returns without a reboot. I've spoken to my ISP (Digital Space, formerly Timico), and checked their logs, and this doesn't, at least so they claim, appear to be their fault. I've connected to the test port inside the BT master socket with the phone disconnected and there is no difference. Consulting the advice on the main thinkbroadband site, I thought this might be a ring wire problem, but there are no visible wires to disconnect at the back of the faceplate. To my recollection, the master socket is some 20 years old. My next step was to be ringing up BT, but I thought I'd check in here first. By the way, this wouldn't normally be a big problem, but my family includes a couple of forex traders, who sometimes leave programmes running at night. I have no internet upgrade options available. Virgin are close by, but they didn't extend to the houses at the end of a cul de sac where I live. I'd be very grateful for any help.

Do you have a spare router you could try in place of the Netgear as it could be the router that is at fault?

There is unlikely to be any value to ringing BT - Digital Space are your ISP and it is down to them to fix the problem if it is to do with the connection, they deal with BT, the customer does not deal directly with BT as they are operating in a wholesale capacity and therefore their customer is the ISP rather than you.

There is unlikely to be any value to ringing BT - Digital Space are your ISP and it is down to them to fix the problem if it is to do with the connection, they deal with BT

100% agree …. don’t be fobbed off by your ISP.

Whack another router in there, or do a firmware upgrade on the current one.

Thankyou kindly for the replies. Yes, I agree the router is the obvious target. I did update the firmware already, but only recently. There has been improvement, not obviously connected to that update, though it's possibly responsible, given the lag that alterations like that apparently incur. I've not had to reboot the router for 4 days, though internet connection monitor (a browser extension) shows numerous micro-disconnects (seconds or even fractions of a second), none of which has affected anything.

My router is I believe at least 12 years old, which in computer tecnology terms probably means it carries a walking stick, wears a hearing aid, and needs to go to specsavers. I will likely replace it soon. Not before I tweak the bejeesus out of it just for fun. I'd never even read the manual till now.

I'll post again if I learn more. Thanks.