[SOLVED] All network adapters disconnect intermittently

[sathingtonw]

Whether I use the wifi or ethernet the connection drops for about 10 seconds randomly and then comes right back. It happens on ~1-2 hour cycle.

I get a correlating warning in the event viewer that says: "Name resolution for the name {X} timed out after none of the configured DNS servers responded"
Source: DNS Client Events
Event ID: 1014

All drivers for those adapters were updated to the most recent version from the manufacturer. And the problem occurs on both wifi and ethernet so I don't think it is a driver issue. Only my PC is affected, no other devices on my network have this issue so I don't think it's my router or ISP.

Not sure what this is. Been reading forum posts and tinkering with settings for weeks. Nothing seems to work.

Things I have attempted:
Rolling back drivers
Updating drivers
trying other DNS servers
resetting router
changing to static IP
turning off power saving options

ISP: Comcast/Xfinity
Modem/Router: XB6 CGM4140COM
OS: Windows 10 (1903) build 18362.295
Wifi adapter: Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 3165
Ethernet adapter: Qualcomm Atheros AR8171/8175 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller (NDIS 6.30)

 

[Ralston18]

Are you certain that only one network adapter (wired or wireless) is enabled on your PC?

Likewise for other devices.

How many devices (wired and wireless) are on your network?

Run "ipconfig /all" via the Command Prompt and post the results.

 

[sathingtonw]

Are you certain that only one network adapter (wired or wireless) is enabled on your PC?

Likewise for other devices.

How many devices (wired and wireless) are on your network?

Run "ipconfig /all" via the Command Prompt and post the results.

Yes. I had problems when I had just the wifi adapter enabled or just the ethernet adapter enabled. I even tried to bridge them and the same thing happened.

There's a bunch of devices on the network. I would guess like 15-20.

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : DESKTOP-FPVOV23
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : comcast.net
google.com

Ethernet adapter Ethernet:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : hsd1.nh.comcast.net
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Qualcomm Atheros AR8171/8175 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller (NDIS 6.30)
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : F4-8E-38-D9-1B-BA
DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
IPv6 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 2601:18d:8900:ff20::3e3(Preferred)
Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : Sunday, August 25, 2019 1:06:36 PM
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Saturday, August 31, 2019 10:02:09 PM
IPv6 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 2601:18d:8900:ff20:17b:2005:3e60:6764(Preferred)
Temporary IPv6 Address. . . . . . : 2601:18d:8900:ff20:381d:3721:d5bb:4bd1(Preferred)
Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . . : fe80::17b:2005:3e60:6764%13(Preferred)
IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . : 10.0.0.35(Preferred)
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : Sunday, August 25, 2019 1:46:35 PM
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Sunday, September 1, 2019 2:02:50 PM
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : fe80::be9b:68ff:fe47:8fd6%13
10.0.0.1
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 10.0.0.1
DHCPv6 IAID . . . . . . . . . . . : 133467704
DHCPv6 Client DUID. . . . . . . . : 00-01-00-01-23-F1-68-E0-F4-8E-38-D9-1B-BA
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 2001:558:feed::1
2001:558:feed::2
2001:4860:4860::8888
2001:4860:4860::8844
606:4700:4700::1111
2606:4700:4700::1001
1.1.1.1
1.0.0.1
8.8.8.8
8.8.4.4
208.67.222.222
208.67.220.220
75.75.75.75
76.76.76.76
NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . : Enabled

 

[Ralston18]

So with respect to "All network adapters disconnect intermittently" you mean just the network adapters on the problem PC - correct?

Verify that only the Ethernet adapter is enabled.

Look in Windows 10's Reliability History for error codes and warnings that correspond to the 1- 2 hour PC disconnects.

Try running the built-in Windows 10 network trouble shooters; the troubleshooters may find and fix something.

 

[sathingtonw]

So with respect to "All network adapters disconnect intermittently" you mean just the network adapters on the problem PC - correct?

Verify that only the Ethernet adapter is enabled.

Look in Windows 10's Reliability History for error codes and warnings that correspond to the 1- 2 hour PC disconnects.

Try running the built-in Windows 10 network trouble shooters; the troubleshooters may find and fix something.

Yes. Both the wifi and the ethernet adapters on the problem PC. Right now I have the ethernet adapter enabled and the wifi adapter disabled.

Sorry if I wasn't clear enough. I meant my internet drops for 10 seconds and comes back but it occurs once every hour or two.

I tried running the trouble shooter in the brief window of time that the problem exists but by the time it starts running the connection is already back and it says it's fine. No microsoft - no it isn't.

I looked in the reliability history and didn't find anything correlating.

 

[sathingtonw]

When it happens: the network tile in the performance tab of the task manager completely disappears. In the network connections section of the control panel it says "disconnected" with the red x and then a few seconds later it says identifying and it comes back.

At the start of this problem I switched to my wifi adapter because I wanted to see if it was just a bad cable or something but the red x was showing up the same way for the wifi connection also.

 

[Ralston18]

With 15 - 20 devices I am leaning towards some misconfiguration issue.

Do you have admin rights to the modem/router? The modem/router's logs, if available and enabled, may provide some clue as to the source of the problem.

Does the following links show your modem/router?

https://www.xfinity.com/support/articles/broadband-gateways-userguides

https://secure.xfinity.com/anon.com...gateway/HOW5220_DG558_XB6_getting_started.pdf

Two immediate suggestions:

1) Sketch out your network to show all, devices, and connectivity. For each device take a look at its' respective IP address, subnet mask, DHCP server and DNS.

For example: if you established a static IP for one system but did not reserve that static IP then DHCP may be issuing that IP address to another device. Does not address the 1-2 hour timing per se but there may be something else running on a device that creates/causes the pattern. Power saver perhaps.

2) Shut down as many devices as possible. See if the problem continues. If not, start bringing the devices back one by one allowing some time for them to appear on the network and prove functional.

My overall thought is that there is an IP conflict in place or being created as some power saver or other system action (e.g., backup, update attempt) occurs. The attempt(s) are every 1 - 2 hours based on other variables at that time.

Are you familiar with the arp command via the Command Prompt?

Run "arp -a" on the connected computers. You may spot some conflict or IP addresses that are not as you expect.

 

[sathingtonw]

Yes that is the router. I didn't find anything correlating in the router logs.

IP addresses looked ok when I ran the arp -a command

I was searching around about the only event that corresponded with the drops which was event ID 1014 in event viewer. Which I then searched for and found this:
https://social.technet.microsoft.co...ent-id-1014-microsoft-windows-dns-client.aspx

Causes
Customers have reported the following scenarios as possible causes for this event:

- TCP/IP Offload is enabled for a network adapter
- TCP/IP v6 is enabled and their ISP does not yet support TCP/IP v6.
- The spanning tree “portfast" setting is not enabled on your servers switch ports.
- Router and PC communicating with different channel or standard.

Then I ran a IPv6 Test and came back with this result:

https://imgur.com/a/8cbv1I3

View: https://imgur.com/a/8cbv1I3


- Test IPv6 large packet: timeout (16.182s)

. . .validates that IPv6 requests with large packets work. If this test times out, but other IPv6 tests work, it suggests that there may be PMTUD issues; possibly involving IP tunnels. Double check to make sure that ICMPv6 Type 2 ("Packet Too Big") messages are not filtered by your firewall.


Would a large packet timeout from IPv6 cause the whole network adapter to disconnect? I'm going to try disabling IPv6 in the meantime to see if it stops.

Update: fixed IPv6 large packet issue through firewall rule. I will see if it affects the network dropping issue tomorrow.

Update 2: after adding the IPv6 firewall rule I haven't had any network drops since. This seems to have fixed it.