Billion UK Forum

Hi all,

Switched from a Netgear DG834GT to a Billion 7800N in the last 5 days or so and while its been mainly plain sailing it hasnt been perfect and has today got worse.
I shall elaborate...
While the wifi seemed fine i noticed on occasions it would seem to drop (happened on my laptop and wifes netbook at same time). I have been running Routerstats lite to monitor the line and it went to 0dB but with a downward red line to indicate a none response from the router rather than a disconnection (ie line dropped sync).
Telnet into the router and doing "adsl info --stats" also reported no LOS (Loss of Signal) over the complete up time so it could only be a wifi drop/glitch in my opinion. This kind of bears out in that running Routerstats wired direct to the router via ethernet over a 24hr+ period saw no downward red lines on the Routerstats plot.

So i was kinda of putting up with this but today the internet dropped and i couldnt get reconnected (line was synced, no settings had been touched etc). A reboot did nothing so i did a reset to factory defaults and reinput my details and all was fine. At that point i thought i might as well upgrade the firmware from 1.05 (not sure if there was a letter on the end...) to 1.06e which went smoothly but it is now reporting my line attenuation is 41dB when before it was reporting 33dB!
Re-trying my Netgear and its 34dB (same as it always has been on that router, 33-34dB depending on the router used, a 3COM reports 33dB) on the same filter and wiring (also tried another ADSL cable from master socket to router with no change).
Tried flashing firmwares 1.06d and 1.06b and its the same, reporting 41dB. I havent got firmware 1.05 to try.

So now i'm using my Netgear again (at 34dB)!

Any help suggestions welcome, is this a problem that has been seen before on the 7800N or is my 7800N "dying"?

(i'm on ADSLMax, G.DMT).

Well managed to find 1.05 firmware on this forum and reflashed, it shows line attenuation as 33dB again! So something up with the 1.06 range of firmware for me at least, must be the router?
Reflashed to 1.06e and the raised attenuation is still there but have left it as this to try, it appears to be just mis-reporting it as doing an SNR tweak to get me back to ~6dB brings about a 8128kbps profile again which i can just manage on a 33-34dB line and ADSLMax so pretty sure its not actually 41dB as reported.

Is it worth enabling the PhyR and SRA?

Will see how the wifi goes, i've put it on b+g+n rather than g+n as it was before as i've read of at least one person with issues with just having it set as g+n.....we shall see.

Mine reports an unduly high downstream attenuation too. It doesn't affect the performance - it's just an odd reported value. In my case, other routers report 40 - 41 dB but the 7800N reports 48 dB. It's still the best of the bunch for speed and stability.

Attenuation isn't a simple measurement - it's a sort of weighted average of the different levels of attenuation of the numerous tones which make up the ADSL signal. I presume that the algorithm which the 7800N uses for calculating the value has got a bug in it.

Thanks. So i'm not alone, 1.05 is ok though so something has been messed up going to the 1.06 range of firmwares.

Wifi still isnt right.
Drops or intermittantly drops for 10 seconds or so sometimes on/off over a minute or 2. Wifes netbook also is doing it at the same time so it must be the router.
Picked channel 10 rather than 7 now (though nothing on 7 when monitoring any other routers using these channels) and set the channel width to 20Mhz rather than 20/40Mhz.

See how that bears out!

OK something interesting!

Changing to "20MHz only" seems to have done the trick in spades.
I get 5/5 Signal quality anywhere in my house (4 bed detached), router is near the corner of the house downstairs and at the opposite corner of the house upstairs i'm still getting 5/5. Also in the dining room/kitchen where my laptop is mostly the signal to the router has to go through 3 brick walls (downstairs WC off the hallway adds an extra wall) and thats about 7m in total distance....still 5/5 signal quality. My throughput rate varies but its usually at least 54mbps even at the furthest distance and usually in triple figures (max 144mbit on single channel 20Mhz only). Note this is on wireless "N" of course.

Wifes Netbook (NC10) which has quite a weak wireless card and is only wireless G capable is now at 54mbps whereever i am in the house, before the speed was up and down as you would generally expect depending on location. The signal quality meter does move up and down unlike mine (mine has a better Intel wifi card) but it seems noticeably stronger than its ever been.

I've never seen it this good on my Netgear DG834GT (wireless G) or with the Billion on 20/40MHz (it seems).

Also using inSSIDer 2.0 to monitor wifi strength and other wireless networks in the neighbourhood....recommended if you are having issues (its Open source).
http://www.metageek.net/products/inssider/

OK i was maybe optimistic it was sorted, its isnt but i have found the culprit - the microwave! I can replicate the lack of wifi transmission at will.

Never had this on my DG834GT so is the 7800N prone to this sort of problem?

I guess a possible workaround would be to wire up when someone is going to be nuking some trough.

However, I came across this article which may assist you in determining the best channel to use, unfortunately the most suitable channel for you, could be over subscribed by others. http://cow.neondragon.net/index.php/eff ... s-internet

Best of luck, either way

Yes i've tried a few different channels.
I was on channel 10 and it kills the wifi, tried channel 1 and 5 and its better on 1 (furthest away from 10) but still gets blotted out. Not tried 13 yet though but its not far off 10 so not expecting it to be much better.
I'll try my Netgear router as well, dont recall having this when using the Netgear so it may be better (worth a try) or it might be the microwave is on its way out?