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[TP2NAS]

Hi All, just found this forum. My rambling is a bit long, but there is a question at the end.

Not long after I bought this TD-W8980 the 5Ghz started to waffle up and down randomly. I called tech support and they told me to reboot. Having updated the firmware three times and hard-reset the thing about a zillion, all to no avail as I kept asking for an RMA to return it for warranty-service and they kept telling me to reboot.  Disgusted, I bought a Buffalo with dd-wrt.

Yesterday I was throwing out junk and noticed the 8980 with the USB ports on the back so fired it up. I then dumbed down the setup to work basically a NAS server with a wifi AP.

All good, well, almost all good. The errant 5GHz wifi needs to be disabled. My cell phone automatically locks onto the 5GHz which is normally OK, just not with the 8980.

So, I decided to open it up and cut the wires to the antennas. But I find there are five. Two Internal and three external all leads are soldered to the board.
Looking from the back, Jumpers...
J503 Right external
J505 Center external
J507 Left external
J509 Left Internal
J508 Right Internal

Sooo, can anyone please tell me which antenna leads I need to clip from the jumpers to nobble 5GHz?

Had they been aerial-lead clips I could swap around, but soldered directly to the board means cutting!

Thanks

[kitz]

Apologies if Im stating the obvious, as I had TD-W9980's which are based on the TD-W8980.   IIRC you can configure 2.4Ghz and 5GHz entirely independently from within the web-GUI.

You could either turn 5Ghz off completely or even make specific settings for each band.

Under 'Dual Band' - go in there and select the setting which says something like "Only work in the 2.4Ghz range"

OR

you could try using the MAC filtering under 5GHz Menu and specifically set a rule up to deny your cell phone access to the 5Ghz frequencies.

HTH

[TP2NAS]

Thanks Kitz,

I had tried that but the thing still broadcast the 5GHz SSID, TP's firmware programmers are not the brightest in the world. Or, it maybe a hardware issue linked with the 5GHz problems it has.

Anyway, have worked around the issue by using a 2.4GHz AP box a friend gave me. I was then able to use the switch on the back of the 8980 to turn off all wifi and just us it as a NAS.

Got it all going around 10:00 last night so will give it some stress testing today as a NAS.

Thanks again.

[kitz]

I had tried that but the thing still broadcast the 5GHz SSID,

d'oh.  That seems a bit stupid 

Sorry that I couldn't help with the hardware question, but Im glad you found a solution.



-----------
Just to double check another obvious I trust that you tried

Wireless 5GHz > Basic Settings > Uncheck "Enable SSID Broadcast"

Then go into the 2.4GHz settings and make sure SSID is enabled for that.

In theory that should just turn off the 5GHz broadcast.   
If that doesnt work then it may be worthwhile dropping TPLink a ticket, because something like that should easily be rectified in the next f/w update.

[loonylion]

-----------
Just to double check another obvious I trust that you tried

Wireless 5GHz > Basic Settings > Uncheck "Enable SSID Broadcast"

Then go into the 2.4GHz settings and make sure SSID is enabled for that.

In theory that should just turn off the 5GHz broadcast.   
If that doesnt work then it may be worthwhile dropping TPLink a ticket, because something like that should easily be rectified in the next f/w update.

That won't help, it just hides the ssid, the network is still available and the phone will still use it. The 5ghz radio(s) need(s) to be turned off by the sounds of it.

[TP2NAS]

Just to double check another obvious I trust that you tried

Wireless 5GHz > Basic Settings > Uncheck "Enable SSID Broadcast"

If that doesnt work then it may be worthwhile dropping TPLink a ticket, because something like that should easily be rectified in the next f/w update.

Thanks, sorry for the delay between posts.
Disabling the SSID works kinda, but windows then shows "One Hidden network."

As to TPLink and a ticket, maybe read my Op second par. Tech-Support are totally worthless.

[TP2NAS]

That won't help, it just hides the ssid, the network is still available

Exactly. however I have gone one step farther and dumped the useless TP-Link entirely.

I found a used-like-new Belkin router (Share N300) on Amazon for 28-bucks-shipped. It has a USB and I flashed it with dd-wrt-mega. With an SSD on the USB port is lighting fast as NAS. Happy camper and rid of tp.

As to the "used-like-new," it was nothing like new, the Belkin outer casing had been hammered, but the guts works fine.