Question One laptop on my network disconnects every few minutes even with an external dongle. What is causing this?

ukiltmybrutha

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May 4, 2012
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This issue has been bugging me for years. About every 5 minutes I will lose connection to my LAN and network on just one laptop of many in my home. The connection then restores itself after about 20 seconds then disconnects after about 5 minutes...rinse and repeat.

I am running an MR1100 AT&T Hotspot via AT&T Firstnet through an ASUS RT-AC68U router.

On this HP Envy laptop running W10 ENT, it does not matter whether or not I run the internal network card or an external dongle...the same thing happens.

I have another FirstNet AT&T Hotspot which is not connected to my router at all. I do not lose connection when using this Hotspot on the same laptop ever.

The router seems to be blocking traffic to this laptop every few minutes in my opinion.

Another affliction that seems to be related is that the laptop must ALWAYS be manually reconnected to the MR1100/Asus Router combo upon reboot. No other laptop in my home requires this but I do not have to manually reconnect to anything so long as I use the other FirstNet AT&T Hotspot.

Any ideas?

Thanks
 
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kanewolf

Titan
Moderator
This issue has been bugging me for years. About every 5 minutes I will lose connection to my LAN and network on just one laptop of many in my home. The connection then restores itself after about 20 seconds then disconnects after about 5 minutes...rinse and repeat.

I am running an MR1100 AT&T Hotspot via AT&T Firstnet through an ASUS RT-AC68U router.

On this HP Envy laptop running W10 ENT, it does not matter whether or not I run the internal network card or an external dongle...the same thing happens.

I have another FirstNet AT&T Hotspot which is not connected to my router at all. I do not lose connection when using this Hotspot on the same laptop ever.

The router seems to be blocking traffic to this laptop every few minutes in my opinion.

Another affliction that seems to be related is that the laptop must ALWAYS be manually reconnected to the MR1100/Asus Router combo upon reboot. No other laptop in my home requires this but I do not have to manually reconnect to anything so long as I use the other FirstNet AT&T Hotspot.

Any ideas?

Thanks
What do the logs on the router say ?
Are you running stock firmware or Merlin on that router ?
 

microtank

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Mar 26, 2021
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It all depends on how many devices are connected to 4G receiver. And knowing 4G. It needs to go 221 miles before it can get online and I live in a major city with full signal. From my location I get around 10 mbps download in my home and it usually has a struggling upload rate which I’ve seen get to 176 mbps. Your lap tap can easily use all that bandwidth loading up a page. And if you have multiple tabs or windows open, the ads themselves can easily eat all the bandwidth. Your phone can as well. A USB adapter by default is a nightmare, and if it’s a AC USB adapter, you have to go to device manager and find you USB adapters network adapter and find the 802.11 tab and change it to n or g, or b as a last resort. This might even be the same for the lap tops receiver. That may fix connectivity, but once you exceed your bandwidth even with fiber 1 gigabit, if the device decides it needs all bandwidth you will have problems, even through a wired connection. There’s a lot more to it, but if you have 10 mbps, technically all devices would need 2 mbps to be sustainable. A QoS setting on the night could do that, but it vary well may be just the USB adapter, and if it’s the laptops receiver as well, then it might be a bandwidth issue. Plus don’t forget the newer the hardware the more you need to find updates and need firmware for these receivers.
 

ukiltmybrutha

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It all depends on how many devices are connected to 4G receiver. And knowing 4G. It needs to go 221 miles before it can get online and I live in a major city with full signal. From my location I get around 10 mbps download in my home and it usually has a struggling upload rate which I’ve seen get to 176 mbps. Your lap tap can easily use all that bandwidth loading up a page. And if you have multiple tabs or windows open, the ads themselves can easily eat all the bandwidth. Your phone can as well. A USB adapter by default is a nightmare, and if it’s a AC USB adapter, you have to go to device manager and find you USB adapters network adapter and find the 802.11 tab and change it to n or g, or b as a last resort. This might even be the same for the lap tops receiver. That may fix connectivity, but once you exceed your bandwidth even with fiber 1 gigabit, if the device decides it needs all bandwidth you will have problems, even through a wired connection. There’s a lot more to it, but if you have 10 mbps, technically all devices would need 2 mbps to be sustainable. A QoS setting on the night could do that, but it vary well may be just the USB adapter, and if it’s the laptops receiver as well, then it might be a bandwidth issue. Plus don’t forget the newer the hardware the more you need to find updates and need firmware for these receivers.

I usually get no less than 20mbps with my 4G LTE and it averages around 40mbps. FirstNet is pretty good even though I am in a rural area. I failed to mention that this issue is agnostic to ISP. When I had Xfinity it would do the same. Your response is very articulate and valid. I just think that throughput is not the issue here.

Remember, once connected to an alternate Hotspot, the issue goes away. Same AT&T FirstNet.

Thank you.
 
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ukiltmybrutha

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I don't want to feed any thoughts that might make this thread go into a different direction but it almost seems like my router does not like this particular device for some reason. I am sure that there are logs BUT I am not very good at slicing through.
What do the logs on the router say ?
Are you running stock firmware or Merlin on that router ?

Could you please tell me which logs to look for and what to look for in the logs? As I mentioned, I am not great at reviewing logs.

I am using Merlin but have used the ASUS standard firmware. Either way, the issue persists.
 
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kanewolf

Titan
Moderator
I don't want to feed any thoughts that might make this thread go into a different direction but it almost seems like my router does not like this particular device for some reason. I am sure that there are logs BUT I am not very good at slicing through.


Could you please tell me which logs to look for and what to look for in the logs? As I mentioned, I am not great at reviewing logs.

I am using Merlin but have used the ASUS standard firmware. Either way, the issue persists.
I would start with the system log on the router. My guess it is a problem on the laptop, since it is a single device problem. You will probably have to do something like boot a linux OS or get a USB ethernet adapter.
 
Unfortunately no. This laptop is not equipped with an RJ45 jack.
Is that a tablet pc of some kind? Model name of the laptop?

Try USB ethernet adapter then (to rule out wifi issues)

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ukiltmybrutha

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It's an HP Envy 360. It's a full size laptop. I will start with the system log on the router? Just look for anything pertaining to this IP address on the router maybe?

I will see if I have any device like that laying around. Fortunately, I am close enough to the router to test this out.
 

ukiltmybrutha

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I was able to find the instances of being kicked off via MAC Address....

Please see below: I have entered a fake MAC Address for relative anonymity...

Mar 29 10:23:32 syslog: wlceventd_proc_event(490): eth1: Deauth_ind 50:32:75:c2:d0:a5, status: 0, reason: Unspecified reason (1), rssi:0
Mar 29 10:23:33 syslog: wlceventd_proc_event(526): eth1: Auth 50:32:75:c2:d0:a5, status: Successful (0), rssi:0
Mar 29 10:23:33 syslog: wlceventd_proc_event(536): eth1: ReAssoc 50:32:75:c2:d0:a5, status: Successful (0), rssi:0