After many, many failed attempts to fix our home Internet network, I believe I have found the solution.
UPDATE: July 20, 2013 – I think I have it pinpointed to heat. This week, the temperature has reached well beyond 90°F, and this was when the disconnects started happening. Naturally, the temperatures were stable up until last week, which would explain why we could have all the connections at once. But the combination of multiple connections and the horrible weather, would probably explain why the router was feeling like it was being attacked. It’s one thing if the router was about to die, it’s another if it still works but is malfunctioning because it’s trying to protect itself. I found an article somewhere suggesting that routers start coming with heatsinks. That might help. So if none of the previous suggestions work, and your router can still function otherwise, look into cooling it to an operational temperature.
UPDATE: July 18, 2013 – Still can’t run the home network without it crashing. If it’s all cabled, then it’ll work. If it’s all wired, it might work 70% of the time. If it’s all at once, it won’t work. It seems to be my Vista. It boggles my mind because there was no problem up until a week ago.
Well, another temporary solution for wired computers is to disable your router’s security, log into it, then enable the router’s security again. It’s kinda like getting a stamp on the hand at a club when the bouncer (a friend) looks the other way. It seemed to work for our wired computers until we plugged a cabled pc in, and it all went to moot.
Otherwise, if it can’t handle the load it used to, it might be because it’s been used up? Is the router failing? If so, why does it still work good when it’s either all wired pcs only, or all cabled pcs only?
UPDATE: July 15, 2013 – I’ve been browsing all the forums with the keywords for router disconnect. I found a very helpful thread (a year old, though), but it’s solution helped out (at least, I hope it’s the proper fix). It turns out, you have a cap on your Internet service, and your provider might enforce that. So is the case with our ATT DSL. So the advice in the thread was to turn down your wireless adapter so that it only sends and receives a smaller amount like 18 Mbps. The problem is if you are using a dongle or USB adapter, those are set by default at 54 Mbps, and if you’re not subscribed to the full 54 Mbps service, then your router will think you are bombarding it with huge data requests and shut down. (The funny thing is this hadn’t been a problem for years up until a week ago. Ain’t that a bitch?) So if you can access your wireless adapter’s properties via Windows Device Manager, then turn down the signals. Again, cable-wired ethernet will almost always work because it is considered trusted.
So, for now, the bandwidth is smaller for the wireless users in the home network, but at least the DSL gateway/router isn’t shutting down. We’ll see tomorrow. But for now, it’s not crashing.
UPDATE: July 15, 2013 – It seems turning off Browser Election didn’t fix the problem. I’ve been able to get it running simultaneously for an ALL WIRELESS home network, or sole CABLED home network. Either, or, meaning only some of the family members will be able to use dedicated Internet at any one time. Well, it’s now utterly useless. Cabled seems to get full priority and will work once the router is booted back up. Wireless is no luck. I guess this isn’t a solution. It must be someone abusing the ATT hardware. I gave a call to customer service, but the entire process is automated. Go figure. So as of now, still no solution.
July 13, 2013
If you have all Windows 7 computers, this shouldn’t be a problem. But if you have any Windows operating systems prior, ie., Vista, XP, 98, 95, etc., then there is a compatibility service called Browser Election. Browser election chooses one of those computers on your network to be the Master Browser, and also contains a list of all the computers that are on your local network.
Since all the computers on my personal home network were on 7, and my computer was on Vista, these Windows 7 computers have to cater to my computer with the outdated technology of Browser Election. So to be safe, I turned off Browser Election on all the other computers and left only one in charge. IT IS IMPORTANT THAT YOU HAVE AT LEAST ONE COMPUTER AS THE MASTER BROWSER, otherwise, you’re router won’t be able to startup. It’s kinda like a handshake with your ISP.
So this is how you disable Browser Election on your slave computers on your network:
On Windows Vista, 7:
1. Go to Start, type into the Search bar for “services.msc”.
2. Find “Computer Browser” in the list of services.
3. Double-click on it to access its Properties.
4. In the Recovery tab, set the First, Second, and Subsequent Failures to “Take No Action”. REMEMBER DO NOT CHANGE THESE IN YOUR MASTER BROWSER COMPUTER.
5. In the General tab, disable the Startup Type, and Stop the Service Status.
6. Click Apply, and OK.
You Master Browser should preferably be the computer that is hard-connected via ethernet cable to your router. Slave browsers can be connected or wireless.
I hope this helps! Questions and comments are welcome!
Tags: 7, browser election, cable, computer, crash, cuts off, disconnect, dsl, ethernet, fail, internet, lan, laptop, local, malfunction, microsoft, modem, network, pc, red lights, registry, router, vista, web, windows, xp
Thanks for very nice article sharing.