What could be causing a LAN spike => lost internet ???

Hi all,

As above really - and this issue is beginning to really [censored] me off.

Let's start with my setup: Hey!Broadband 1gb connection, TP link router connected to the ONT, a few wired connections into the router including (a) a couple of daisy chained switches and (b) an Eero Pro mesh.

99.999% of the time the setup works absolutely perfectly.

Occasionally, normally whilst watching a movie from my LAN based Plex server, the movie will just stop and the whole house will lose it's internet connection. The lights on the eeros turn red, the internet LED on the router goes orange but all the lights on the ONT stay green.

The only solution I have found to fix this so far is turn everything - router, eeros and switches - off for several hours and then hope everything is fine when it's all powered up.

When the router is showing an orange light I can't even connect to it via a wired connection to see any logs - and the logs are wiped when the router reboots as well from what I can tell.

I am assuming green lights on the ONT mean the outside connection is still fine but is there anyway I can prove this ?

Does anyone have any ideas what sort of spike - for want of a better word - this could be and how I can stop it from having such a destructive effect ?

TIA for any help.

Regards,

Adam

Someone cleverer than me will be along shortly … but you ought to be able to set up a direct connection between a laptop / computer and the ONT directly.

My guess is maybe the router

What model is the tplink router?

also this may be of an issue after we sort the main issue

couple of daisy chained switches

updated bit

Also how many eero's have you got ....... (asking because i would like you at some stage to swap one of eero's in place of the tplink)?

Edited by Taras (Wed 24-Jan-24 08:35:46)

The red lights on the Eero just mean they can't see the Internet.

The green lights on the ONT suggest the ONT thinks the onward Internet connection is fine.

The lights on the router plus it being completely unresponsive over the LAN port suggest that your router is terminally crashing each time.

It is likely that if you just turned the router off for a period of time then you wouldn't need to power cycle everything else for it to come back.

My money is on a router that is overheating and dying unceremoniously and needing to be turned off for a time for the router to cool back down again. Once it is cool again it is able to boot back up.

If it is your own router then it is either trying to return it if under warranty or I think probably time to get a replacement.

It appears like the TP-Link may be suffering from buffer bloat or similar conditions that has been badly handled in its firmware or an overheating condition causing the router to just die.

Is there plenty of airflow around the router?

You don't state WHICH TP-Link router you are using, but my TP-Link Archer AX3000 seems to cope with a situation similar to yours (minus the eero - I'm using a TP-Link OneMesh extender), including the LAN hosted plex server.

As has previously been mentioned, you could try disconnecting everything and setting up a PPPoE session from a laptop connected via ethernet direct into the ONT.

Try streaming something from an online source then, and see if it drops.

Do you have an alternative router (can you use the eero kit as a router/mesh all-in-one for testing?) to see if that suffers the same fate?

Edited by haydnwalker (Wed 24-Jan-24 09:14:28)

the op's got several eros i thing (how ever they are written) so he can swap around. My old tp link archer did the constantly reboot thing when i added a new phone wifi calling...

That was years ago. but ideally he needs to play router swapsies. I can rule out at this stage the cascading switches - that i think has an impact but the "dead internet" situation.

Just a thought.
Can you setup a Syslog server on your Plex server (NAS?) If so, your TP-Link may be able to write logs to this Syslog server so you have logs even after a reboot of the Router.

According to the router's admin page it is an Archer AX20.

My limited knowledge of networking tells me the eeros are just showing the consequences of the router being 'down' rather than actually being part of the problem.

The device watching the film, and the the Plex server, are both hard wired (via the switches) to the router which is acting as the DHCP server. The main eero is just wired to the router (and has two satellite eeros off it)

I suppose I could use the eero as a test; the only reason I am still using the router is that the eero only has 1 LAN port on it so if I, eventually, made the eero the DHCP server (and entry to the LAN) then I would need another switch anyway.

I might look into that.

To be clear, the Plex server is actually running in a Docker container on a Raspberry Pi but I don't believe that is the issue either given how infrequently this issue happens.

Sorry ... are you saying the cascading switches might be an issue or are not an issue ?

Also, to be clear .... the router is not constantly rebooting. It just decides it can't connect to the internet anymore; and turning it off and immediately back on doesn't solve the issue (it still thinks it can't find the internet unless it left powered off for a while)

Edited by AdamBrunt (Wed 24-Jan-24 12:00:46)