I have FIOS triple play and I've noticed an issue. At what seemed like random times, my computer would lose internet connectivity. Often times when this happened, other devices in my home (ipad, other laptop) would NOT lose internet connectivity. In order to get the internet back on my main computer I would need to unplug the Verizon router, plug it back in, and everything is fine.
I thought it could be an issue with my computer, but then one day I noticed the same thing happened on my ipad, and another laptop.
Then I was recently trying to upload 3 videos simultaneously. Not terribly large videos, about 150 MB each. I noticed that it would never complete as I was losing internet connectivity on that main computer. Power cycle the router/modem and everything is fine again. So it seems like it is tied to the uploading/downloading of larger files (although not terribly large). This has happened even after just watching online video.
Anyone have a similar issue or know what might be causing the issue? This is already the second router I've had (origninally thought it was just an issue with the hardware).
When I called Verizon they suggested I try uploading the videos with a wired connection to the router, which I did. It worked! And I did not lose internet connectivity, although internet got VERY slow while I was doing this (0.53 mb/s download). So there still seems to be some issue there, plus the fact that on wireless I would lose connectivity altogether.
As many users discover, 802.11b/g Wi-Fi operates in spectrum that is shared by a significant number of devices, such as cordless telephones and a wide variety of other wireless devices. My guess is your are losing connectivity on the wireless because one of these other devices is becoming active and causing severe interference with you own Wi-Fi signal.
There are essentially two things you can do. First you try manual assigning the Wi-Fi channel you use. The non-overlapping channers are 1,6 and 11 IIRC. You may experience less or no interference on a different channel. This is done by logging into your router and changing your wireless settings. Your computers will find your network regardless of which channel it is on.
If that doesn't help, the next step is make sure your wireless devices are equipped for dual band 802.11N wireless, and if so, buying a dual band 802.11n wireless access point. Dual band operates in both 2.4GHz (with 802.11b/g) and in the 5GHz band, which has more space, and at the moment, relatively few users. The bonus is that 802.11n can be signficantly faster than 802.11g. Whlie in theory 802.11g can reach 54mbps, real world performance is generally limited to about 20mbps. 802.11n is capable of a significant multiple of 802.11g speeds.
Matthew, thanks very much for the response. You shed light on a situation that no one at Verizon was able to. An update:
* Verizon came to my home and checked out my wiring. Apparently the orignial tech did not do the wiring in an optimal way and the new tech assumed that was the issue.
* They changed the wiring and since this was a sporadic problem it was hard to tell if things were really fixed. But they seemed that way, so great.
* Later that night I lose connectvity again (although without even uploading/downloading any large files).
* I plug in a wireless-n router (dual-band) to my verizon router to see if that fixes the issue.
* Next day, (while still connected to the verizon router for wireless) lose connection... again. Then, I just switched over to the wirelss-n router, and things were working again (didn't have to unplug the verizon router this time).
So, I agree with Matthew, it does seem to have been an issue with the wireless b/g connection. We did recently get a cordless phone that runs on the same spectrum so perhaps that is causing additional inteference (along with other wirelss devices in our home).
I'll do some more testing to confirm the findings and upate this thread in case anyone else has a similar issue.
Thanks again!!
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