Why do my wireless boxes lose the router?

[Ashmore]

Chaps I hope this thread isn't too tangental for the forum. It concerns a niggly issue I have with my wireless music delivery - so it is relevant...

I run three squeezeboxes of various vintages wirelessly off a router (a BT homehub - the version before the new whizzy one they've just released). The router also has a PC and a server running Vortexbox connected by ethernet and often an android phone and netbook wirelessly.

I have a stable broadband connection.

Here's the issue: I frequently have a brief wireless 'out' - typically once during each listening session. The squeezeboxes 'lose' the router, and hang. They appear to reconnect briefly moments later but then drop the signal for a second time. Left to their own devices they will resume about two minutes after the failure. It is a predictable behaviour.

I just can't reason why this happens. All devices have a unique IP via DHCP on a long lease, I have tried different channels. It's not about signal strength as one of the SBs is in the same room. I can't identify a trigger.

I've looked through the router logs and, whilst here are occasional errors, they don't tally with the outages and I can see nothing that seems relevant to the behaviour.

Any bright ideas?

Simon

[Themis]

Probably a server high workload.

Do you stream FLAC or PCM ?

[Ashmore]

FLAC I think... I've got the file types set to FLAC native, MP3: flac/lame, PCM: flac.

[dave2010]

I have had some issues with my network and a Squeezebox. Sometimes, for no apparent reason the SB display will come on, and a message about losing contact with the server will appear. This can happen even if the SB (SB3) is not playing any music. For quite a while I wondered if it was a problem with my router, and indeed the routers have been changed over the years but this still happens. There doesn't normally seem to be a problem with music unless the failure is catastrophic, as the player buffers music for quite a long time.

Have you got any cordless phones near the wireless access point of the router? Or microwave ovens? I think these may cause problems occasionally. Phones can be tricky, as you may find that others in your house are using the phone, and you may not realise, particularly if you have several cordless phones in different rooms.

I moved our phone base station because I suspected this. Also, do you have any other wireless computer kit in the same rooms? Sometimes if there is another wireless device on a line between one unit and the router there can be an interaction, with a loss of throughput. Some devices are directional too, so rotating them through 90 degrees can significantly modify throughput. This sounds odd, but I have measured throughput changes due to both these effects. Also - this seems obvious - make sure you don't put a wirelss device on top of a metal tray or table. I once put a laptop on top of a biscuit tin, and the wireless connection dropped to the point where I was prompted to measure throughput, and hence discovered some of the effects mentioned.

The new BT routers are supposed to be v good, and indeed may be, but some older routers are more prone to problems. For some it has been recommended that they are power cycled once every 24 hours, either manually or on a time switch.

Another possibility is if you are using HomePlug/Powerline connections between your router and the server machine, though normally failures of those links go hard, and the units have to be reset. If your server machine is newish it should easily have enough computational power, unless you run CPU intensive jobs, or have picked up some form of virus.

If you discover what's causing your problem, do let us know, as this is a problem type which I have been trying to pin down for quite a while.

[WAD62]

FLAC I think... I've got the file types set to FLAC native, MP3: flac/lame, PCM: flac.

Simon, a couple of suggestions, firstly what %age wi-fi reception do your SBs get, you can usually see this in the SB Server settings web page...might be worth checking to see if you're getting enough reception.

Secondly, try the old IT trick, close everything down, unplugging the SBs from the mains, and powering off the server and router...then bring them back up again...in the right sequence i.e. Router, Server, SBs.

[Themis]

FLAC I think... I've got the file types set to FLAC native, MP3: flac/lame, PCM: flac.

Thank you.

Most probably then the server is too busy at regular intervals.
This kind of behaviour is not easy to analyse from a distance,there could be various reasons for such a thing. But I will try to do my best.

In the meanwhile:
- Which kind of server is it ? Processor, memory,OS ?
- Is there any Media Server service running ?
- Is the server connected via WiFi to the router as well ? Try hard-wiring it to the router.
- Do you have any "green" (energy saving) software installed ? Is the server's energy consumption policy to "normal" (not "energy saving") ?

[Ashmore]

Thank you all for your responses so far.

Futrher clarifications:
Signal strength ranges from 95% from the nearby unit to 45% for the one furthest away.
The server is an Atom N270 @ 1.60GHz - running with 2gig of RAM. The OS is vortexbox, a dedicated squeezebox distro of a Fedora release (Laughlin). It serves no other need and often happily serves radio to one device and FLAC to another. It is really stable and simply doesn't fail.
It is connected to the router via an ethernet cable.
No green stuff
There are cordless phones, and I live in a resdiential are where there are plenty of other wireless enabled homes.

I have always assumed that it was about network congestion - you know someting interferring with the signal causing it to lose it's way, but of course this is just an assumption on my part.

Simon

[Themis]

Well, the problem with the Squeezebox, is that it has several seconds of buffer. A network congestion (if any) lasts a few tens of milliseconds at its worse. It can slow down some connections, but it can certainly not interrupt them for two minutes...

I have a couple of questions more:
- Have you applied any "modifications" for your SB ? (like the ones mentioned in the forums)
- Is the dropout problem recent ? Has it been constant since it appeared ?

[Ashmore]

Thanks Themis

No mods and yes I would say this is a long term constant issue.

[Themis]

Ok, a simple check:

If it's a server congestion, then all connected SBs should have the same connection probleme at the same time. If they don't disconnect simultaneously, it's not a server congestion (but it could still be a Squeezebox Server software bug).

If it's a wifi congestion, then all connected devices (PC, phones, SBs etc) should suffer from a simultaneous disconnection. If it's not the case, then it's not the wifi.

If disconnection is not related to a specific device, but can "randomly" affect connected devices, then there are two possibilities left:
- A router DHCP malfunction.
- A router general malfunction.

Try to eliminate the first possibility by affecting static IP address on some devices, without using the DHCP service on your router.