unstable net connection with wrt54g using 1.0.8
Posted: Wed Sep 02, 2009 6:25 pm
I'm having some trouble with a reliable broadband connection via my WRT54G (v1.1) running Gargoyle 1.0.8 via a D-Link DSL300G ADSL router. This hardware setup had worked for many years using another ISP and stock Linksys firmware (I've changed ISP since then and their freebie wifi router
couldn't do dyndns or bandwidth monitoring or give reasonable wifi reception through two walls).
Typically I appear to be suddenly offline, webpages fail to load, ssh sessions out die on me, the connection is too unstable to support an nx session out, wii updates fail with cryptic Nintendo error codes etc.
When I test using ping through to the ADSL box I tend to lose about 2-3% of packets. I'll typically see the following (host is 172.21.1.124, wrt54g is 172.21.1.100, adsl is 192.168.0.1 and has given 192.168.0.2 to the wan
i'f of the wrt54g, I'm using the wired LAN to eliminate the wifi side of things):-
I've tried replacing all ethernet cables between machine, router & adsl and get similar results. Originally I had the same using wifi (WPA2 AES). I've also tried flood pinging between two machines on the LAN ports and get 0% loss, and also direct connection from machine to adsl (ie no wrt54g) and got 0% loss. I've also tried a long flood ping to the wrt54g and again got 0% loss after about 30 mins.
I have also tried to setup my machine as a DHCP server, delivering the same IP the DSL box would to the wrt54g. I then attached another laptop to the LAN port and did the same flood ping (ie from LAN to WAN port through wrt54g). Again 0% packet loss.
The adsl line uses dynamic addresses (another reason I want Gargoyle and
friendly integration of opendns & dyndns) and I'm reasonably sure that the line in is stable ('cos the IP stays the same, whereas if it dropped I'm sure they'd give me another new IP).
I have QoS disabled, but bandwidth monitor set to 15mins. Ultimately I want to cap usage along the lines of my monthly cap, but for now this is switched off.
I've run out of ideas!
Some other things to note:-
I'd been trying out the 1.0 beta series, and was stuck on 1.0.beta5. I had some trouble getting the wrt54g to use 1.0.5 either through the update mechanism or via tftp (which was how I got it there first!!) - in the end I needed to set the boot_wait variable in the nvram, but still the tftp wouldn't reprogram the box. What I then did was scp the image over and programmed it via mtd command
as per instructions for one of the Fonera units on the forum. Upgrading from 1.05 to 1.0.7 and then 1.08 worked fine.
What I have also noticed is that I have *lots* of variables in nvram (506 according to 'nvram show |wc -l'). Many of them date back many years to previous stock firmware and include long expired passwords and network configurations. Is this benign? 'nvram show' reports size: 9858 bytes (22910 left).
I also notice that the Status page of Gargoyle will typically show 89-91%
of the memory used, right now it reports "12.7MB / 14MB (91.2%)"
Can anyone suggest anything else to try and diagnose the problem?
Thanks for reading through!
Daniel
couldn't do dyndns or bandwidth monitoring or give reasonable wifi reception through two walls).
Typically I appear to be suddenly offline, webpages fail to load, ssh sessions out die on me, the connection is too unstable to support an nx session out, wii updates fail with cryptic Nintendo error codes etc.
When I test using ping through to the ADSL box I tend to lose about 2-3% of packets. I'll typically see the following (host is 172.21.1.124, wrt54g is 172.21.1.100, adsl is 192.168.0.1 and has given 192.168.0.2 to the wan
i'f of the wrt54g, I'm using the wired LAN to eliminate the wifi side of things):-
Code: Select all
# ping -f 192.168.0.1
PING 192.168.0.1 (192.168.0.1) 56(84) bytes of data.
EEEEE...................................................................................E...................................................................................E...................................................................................E....................................................................................E...................................................................................E..........................EEEEE...................................................................................E...................................................................................E.................................EEEEEE....................................EEEEE..................................................................................E.................................................................................E..................................................................................E....................................................................................E..................................................................................E...................EEEEE.................................................................................E.................................................................................E..................................EEEEEE...................................^C
--- 192.168.0.1 ping statistics ---
46067 packets transmitted, 44683 received, +47 errors, 3% packet loss, time 162244ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 2.927/3.115/14.709/0.392 ms, pipe 2, ipg/ewma 3.521/3.160 ms
I have also tried to setup my machine as a DHCP server, delivering the same IP the DSL box would to the wrt54g. I then attached another laptop to the LAN port and did the same flood ping (ie from LAN to WAN port through wrt54g). Again 0% packet loss.
The adsl line uses dynamic addresses (another reason I want Gargoyle and
friendly integration of opendns & dyndns) and I'm reasonably sure that the line in is stable ('cos the IP stays the same, whereas if it dropped I'm sure they'd give me another new IP).
I have QoS disabled, but bandwidth monitor set to 15mins. Ultimately I want to cap usage along the lines of my monthly cap, but for now this is switched off.
I've run out of ideas!
Some other things to note:-
I'd been trying out the 1.0 beta series, and was stuck on 1.0.beta5. I had some trouble getting the wrt54g to use 1.0.5 either through the update mechanism or via tftp (which was how I got it there first!!) - in the end I needed to set the boot_wait variable in the nvram, but still the tftp wouldn't reprogram the box. What I then did was scp the image over and programmed it via mtd command
as per instructions for one of the Fonera units on the forum. Upgrading from 1.05 to 1.0.7 and then 1.08 worked fine.
What I have also noticed is that I have *lots* of variables in nvram (506 according to 'nvram show |wc -l'). Many of them date back many years to previous stock firmware and include long expired passwords and network configurations. Is this benign? 'nvram show' reports size: 9858 bytes (22910 left).
I also notice that the Status page of Gargoyle will typically show 89-91%
of the memory used, right now it reports "12.7MB / 14MB (91.2%)"
Can anyone suggest anything else to try and diagnose the problem?
Thanks for reading through!
Daniel
