TP-Link WR1043ND drops connection, need to reconnect

[fefrie]

I gave up and got a new router.

The final kicker was that LAN ports were bad too.

I got sick of trying to chase gremlins.

I guess I should feel fine. It has a build date of april 2010 and I think that I've owned it for as long so I guess I did get my money's worth, although at the time it did cost over $100.

After all that I just got a linksys e900 and everything has been fine with that.

I wish it had gigabit, and dual band, more memory and a faster cpu, but for $25 I can't complain.

I'm hoping that this will last for a couple of years. If it doesn't, I'll be ticked off.

[nawhead]

I don't know if this is the right topic, but I just upgraded a few days ago to a TP-Link WR1043ND w/ Gargoyle 1.5.10 from a Linksys WRT54GL w/ Tomato, and I can replicate this wireless drop issue. All you have to do is start a torrent and set the speed to 3 MB/s or more (I have a 35 Mbps cable connection, ninja-brag), and the wireless drops within 10 minutes. However, if I start a Steam download at 3 MB/s plus, the wireless is rock solid.

When the wireless drops, on the computer (Windows 7), it doesn't say it's disconnected, however, it just has an exclamation point on the wireless icon to notify me there's no Internet connection. When you go to the Gargoyle router management page from another computer, it still shows the dropped computer as being "connected" at 1 mbps. If I wait about 5 minutes, the wireless connection recovers by itself, however. Also, all the other computers with connections (wireless or otherwise) to the router are not affected at all during this downtime . So it's almost as if something is timing out the specific wireless connection that's being "bad" so to speak.

I've read all the online discussions about this issue, and I'm still not convinced of the problem. Just to summarize, most think it's the router itself, and some think it's the cable modem. The latter doesn't make sense since we're talking about the wireless connection, not the actual Internet connection. Also, most people don't take into consideration that it might be the wireless card. And it's my opinion that people are leaving out key details like they just recently upgraded their Internet connection to a higher speed (or the cable company ninja-upgraded their connection w/o notifying them) and the higher speeds are causing the problem with their wireless components.

Since I could never get a stable wireless connection above 20 Mbps with the WRT54GL in 802.11g mode, this was never a issue for me before. But now that I have a 35 Mbps connection in 802.11n mode, I'm starting to suspect the wireless adapter on my computer (TP-Link WN822N) could be part of this problem. This seems like a good line of inquiry since it's an isolated issue on the specific client on the network rather than a network-wide issue.

I've been trying to replicate this problem for 2 days, and one of the simpler solutions I've found is to simply set the torrent application speed under 3 MB/s (2500 KB/s seems to work just fine). The wireless is rock solid then.

(Ed: Sorry for writing a novel. It's been a while since I've been on a technical forum so I want to get all the details right. )

[nawhead]

Update on a breakthrough!?

I recently downloaded an app called DayZ Commander which is a game server matching utility, and I noticed the wireless dropped every time i tried to refresh the servers. Upon further research, I saw that the connections limit was being reached (i.e. 4096/4096) whereupon the wireless would drop out and the web admin page was no longer accessible for a couple minutes.

Playing around with this, I realized I could make the wireless unresponsive by simply setting the Max Connections settings even lower. At 2048, when I tried to refresh the servers, the wireless dropped out within 30 seconds. At 500, the wireless dropped even faster. SO!... what if we tried setting the max connections so it didn't hit the limit?! I set it at the maximum of 16384 and BOOM, no more wireless drop when I refreshed the servers because the max connections was never reached.

Could it be this easy?

gargoyle max conn crop 1.jpg (42.99 KiB) Viewed 15411 times

[Edit: PSA: If you want to test this also using DayZ Commander, be warned the front page is full of adware/malware download links. DO NOT press the green download button.]

[asantaga]

Hey there,

I tried this and alas wifi isnt stable on my wr1043nd (v1.8)..

I've tried the latest build by ispy , the disassoc_low_ack and setting max connections to 16384..

Any other ideas?

[chigo58]

+1 - eagerly awaiting a positive answer here too after having exhausted all options..

Hey there,

I tried this and alas wifi isnt stable on my wr1043nd (v1.8)..

I've tried the latest build by ispy , the disassoc_low_ack and setting max connections to 16384..

Any other ideas?

[asantaga]

Hey

I installed the **latest** openwrt firmware to the router, configured a simple WIFI network and have been using this for a couple of days and ... yes WIFI is stable..

Previously Id have problems after 2-10hrs, but its been solidly working and streaming grooveshark to my mac (my test harness).. ok Im not using torrents, streaming video etc, but this is now working fine...

SOOOOO , I think we can say the problem is fixed in the latest build of openwrt, we just need to wait for gargoyle to catchup.

One of the main reasons why I'm using Gargoyle is that Im after WIFI repeater functionality when I travel.. if I can work this out using openwrt then I could use that but I like the gargoyle Simple UI.. works for me..

The version of openwrt im now using is
BARRIER BREAKER (Bleeding Edge, r38031) on a WR1043 v1.8, (firmware downgraded)

Angelo
Anyway...s

[chigo58]

Angelo, that's good to hear. Can you PM a link for the openwrt build you used? Also was it a straight downgrade from Gargoyle?

Edit 22 Sept: Found the firmware under trunk - tks

[asantaga]

Yup I downloaded the latest trunk

[asantaga]

of interest I've noticed ispyisail has created a new version of gargoyle router with r38033 of gargoyle..

See link http://www.gargoyle-router.com/phpbb/vi ... =14&t=4780

Last week I used r38031 of openwrt FLAWLESSLY whilst in italy (using it as a WIFI repeater) and it worked a treat, so im guessing/hoping this would work too..

Oh BTW, in case anyone is wondering, the reason for liking Gargoyle over openwrt is quite simply, its easier to setup for things like WIFI Repeater etc.. and still is openwrt compatible at the shell

[chigo58]

of interest I've noticed ispyisail has created a new version of gargoyle router with r38033 of gargoyle..

Thanks for the heads up.. am using r38260 on his latest build. Haven't had disconnects since.