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[mlmclaren]

Hi folks,

Over the past 9 months I've been having constant issues with router's, I've had routers ranging from TP-Link's VR900 which gave me DHCP issues which upset some devices, I then had a HH5B which just wouldn't forward ports and was somewhat terrible performer wireless'ly, so I brought a TP-Link Archer C9 but this was let down by EU regs on WiFI so only acheived good performance when setup is a YANK and then only some devices could connect on 5G and devices that tried to conform to EU regs wouldn't stay connected long on 2G once it had figured it was in the UK.

Since then I decided to try BT's Smart Hub but had constant issues of 2G wifi connections dropping and worst off all would just crash randomly and get stuck in a Green status light mode (currently unknown indicator), I've since returned 2 of them to BT for a refund but then even using a HH5 I have noticed the same sort of issues with the router just crashing for some reason, specially when trying to use WPS.

After purchasing an Asus EA-AC87U 4x4 5Ghz Access Point (which is blazing fast and provides good coverage) I decided to purchase a reliable router with just simple job of connecting, assigning IP's and connecting the 2-4 2G devices in our apartment.

Unfortunately that has now crashed a few times and in an only too similar fashion to both BT's HH5 & 6's... So now I'm starting to wonder if somethings wrong with my setup or any of the devices I have connected to the router or if this is something I'm not gonna get fixed anytime soon and maybe due to highly congested spectrum in my building or maybe even due to living so close to Gatwick Airport.

My current setup is as follows:
Billion 8800NL R2:
10/100 Ethrnet:
- LAN 1 -> Sony Android TV
- LAN 2 -> Gigabit Switch -> 5x Sonos Speakers
- LAN 3
- LAN 4
Gigabit LAN/WAN
- LAN 5 -> Gigabit Switch -> 2x WD NAS's + Dell XPS Dock + Asus Access Point > Up To 10 Wireless Devices
2.4Ghz WLAN
- Samsung C460W Printer
- Leitz Icon Label Printer
- Teclast X98 Pro (Windows Tablet)

I would appreciate as much help as possible before we lose our tempers and bin everything.

[WWWombat]

You've gone a similar route to me, then.

I have an 8800NL (but the original version), with a standalone access point for 5GHz and 2.4GHz on two separate SSIDs. The 8800NL does still pump out 2.4GHz on a "backup" SSID, but it sits largely unused. We're in 2.4GHz hell here, so tend to prefer the 5GHz spectrum if possible ... and our first foray with TP-Link hardware suffered like you.

One big difference is that we have a SamKnows whitebox running tests (don't ask about the volume of data), so it is the only thing plugged into the 8800NL's LAN. I then have a large switch behind this, which everything else is connected to, though there are secondary switched in the TV corner and in the office.

I don't think the 8800NL has crashed ever/much - 80/20 FTTC is stable and stays up forever - but we have had one anomoly ... when streaming BT TV channels (ie multicast stuff), the 8800NL would regularly start to suffer issues with some of the other devices connected - in particular, wireless devices would either fail to get an IP address, or would fail to get DNS responses when first attached. This problem seemed to go away (possibly after an upgrade), but I'm no longer on Plusnet's TV trial so can't debug any more. The problems would, at first, cause me to manually reboot the router.

Otherwise, things seem very stable. Uptime is currently 138 days.

[mlmclaren]

UPDATE: I've now returned the Billion to Amazon....

I'm currently connected using one of my 2 BT Home Hub 5B's... I've put my Sonos system on to WiFi mode removing the switch, my smart TV is also now connected to my 5G access point again, so I ow only have 1 of the Gigabit ports connected to one Gigabit switch which then connects to my WAP.

So far all seems to be going alright, my label printer is still connected to the 2G band on the HH5 along with the 5 of my Sonos speakers, hopefully it stays stable.

I was looking at getting a Draytek 2860 (wired router) but feel that if I'm to buy that I should get one of their new WAP's with it to have total capability and also the control from the main router.... unfortunately I've not got £300-400 to splash out on networking hardware at the moment.