Wireless Noob having problems with connection dying!

DaveG · #1 11-21-2002, 01:02 PM

Hoping someone can help me here. If not for me, for the sake of my PC's which are facing being hurled through a window!

I have two XP Pro boxes that I am networking together, using Actiontec PCI 802.11b NIC's. The new PC, "AL" is an Athlon XP system and is connected to the internet via an ADSL modem. The old PC, "ZIGGY" is a K6-2 system, sharing AL's internet connection and sharing files. I even have both PC's able to open remote desktop sessions to each other (not at the same time obviously!).

As for the network, currently I'm not using any WEP or firewall yet, not until I'm happy with the network. The network is a peer to peer, eg a workgroup, which I have named, and I've set my cards to "AD-HOC" mode. I'm not using DHCP, nor am I letting window's configure any of my network options. I have used the TCP/IP settings to manually configure the IP addresses of the two machines. using 192.168.0.x with a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0. Furthermore I've set ZIGGY's default gateway to the value of AL's IP address, and I've used my ISP's dns addresses. I did this because when I was trying to use DHCP I was getting 169.x.x.x addresses asigned which I'm told meant things were going wrong.

To cut a long story short I have disabled all power management on both PC's (including the bios's), and the network connection holds with one exception. If either of the PC's have some sort of password request triggered by inactivity then the connection dies on me and the only way I can reinitiate it is to reboot either of the machines. This even includes if I have the screen saver set to request a password when it closes. Another more relevant example to me is if I'm running a remote desktop session for any length of time. The PC's I'm connecting to obviously goes to the password/welcome prompt, and if it stays like that for any length of time (by means of my running the RD session), then the network connection dies on me, and I have to reboot again!

The driver/software for the NIC's have advanced settings, however I have no documentation (I phoned Actiontec technical support, and they said they didn't have any documentation either!). Hence I do not know what any of them do!

I really hope someone can help. If I've missed any pertinent information, let me know.

Many thanks in advance,
Dave

Greenstead · #2 11-28-2002, 01:02 PM

Seeing as no one has replied I thought to see if I can help (I dunno the answer to your problem).

I have two XP PCs with wireless cards so I can try and see what I get if I set a screensaver password and RD to it.

I wondered what you are using to share the ADSL connection. Not ICS I assume since that includes DHCP and cannot be disabled.

If you post those advanced settings names I can probably say what they are.

DaveG · #3 11-28-2002, 05:31 PM

Thanks for the reply!

Well, since I posted that, I found that even if I have a screen-saver without out a password, it still dies on me. Actually, I did a further test, and did a huge data transfer (I forget how much, but you wouldn't get much change out of a giggle-byte).

The connection cut out before it had finished transfering all the files!!! To me that clinched it, they had to be faulty. They are currently sat in dabs.com test labs awaiting testing and hopefully they'll agree with me and give me a refund.

If dabs.com don't agree they are faulty, consider them for sale once I get them back ;-)

As for settings, I also found out what I needed at the 802.11-planet web site thanks.

Also, it is possible to have ICS running without DHCP. I manually configured my IP addresses, and using the command "ipconfig /all" verifed that DHCP was not enabled. Since I making a peer-to-peer network, I didn't have a DHCP server, and no where to install one from !

I was using DHCP in the first place, but that didn't help.

Thanks,
Dave

PS
I shall be getting some Belkin USB wireless adapters, and hopefully that will work better.

PPS
I have been totally put off Actiontec now. Their products don't get great reviews here and at 802.11-planet.com and also my own experience with their technical support has put me off. While their e-mail support is VERY prompt, I was not impressed with their level of support. Firstly they seem to think that ICS is an advanced feature of their cards and also that it can be uninstalled. Secondly, once they know your cards are communicating that is where their support officially ends. To me I think that is a minimum level and not very good.

PPPS
This is the letter I sent to dabs.com technical labs along with my aledgedly faulty cards...

DESCRIPTION OF SET UP
=====================
Two computers; named "Al" and "Ziggy". Al is linked to the internet via an ADSL modem, Ziggy has internet access via Al by means of internet connection sharing. File sharing and remote desktop access is also set up between both computers. Furthermore both computers are running Windows XP Professional, which these cards are said to be supported by (see retail box!).

Code:

SETTINGS	(Note PM="Power Management")
========	+---------------+----------------+
		|ZIGGY		|AL		 |
+---------------+---------------+----------------+
|OS		|XP Pro		|XP Pro          |
|CPU		|K6-2 500MHz	|Athlon XP 2000+ |
|RAM		|384MB (PC100)	|512 MB (DDR/266)|
|MoBo brand	|Gigabyte	|Asus            |
|ScreenSaver	|Disabled	|Disabled        |
|PM in Windows	|All Off	|All Off         |
|PM in bios	|Disabled	|Disabled        |
|IP Routing	|NO		|YES             |
|INTERNAL IP	|192.168.0.4	|192.168.0.3     |
|SUBNET MASK	|255.255.255.0	|255.255.255.0   |
|Default Gateway|192.168.0.3	|N/A             |
|DNS		|Same as ISP	|Same as ISP     |
|SSID/Work Group|"QUANTUM LEAP"	|"QUANTUM LEAP"  |
|802.11b Power-	|		|		 |
|-Saving Mode	|Disabled	|Disabled        |
+---------------+---------------+----------------+

(Network topology="AD-HOC")

COMPLAINTS
==========
In all cases both computers have power management, screen-savers and password lockouts DISABLED (see table above).
Note that I verify the connection having 'died' by using the "PING" function.
1) Despite both computers being stood side by side with the radio antennas mearly six inches apart, the network through-put never surpasses 50% of the theoretical maximum 11Mbps. (Note, computers were this close for testing purposes. Given that the connection remained intermittent I did not progress to testing them over a distance).
2) If only Ziggy is being used, while Al is unattended, but routing TCP/IP packets between Ziggy and the internet then the connection dies after a period of time. This can be upto 90 minutes.
3) Both computers are active, and a large amount of data is being transfered (upwards of a gigabyte), the connection still dies after a period of time before the transfer is complete.
4) If either computer is logged into the other computer via a Remote Desktop session and the session is idle for a short period of time, the connection dies.
5) The connection dies when either one of the computers are left inactive and the other is in use. This can be as little as 15 minutes.

ATTEMPTED REMEDIES
==================
(As suggested by Actiontec Technical support)
1)Disable power management at the bios on both computers.
2)Reinstall Internet Connection Sharing and card Drivers.
3)Change IP addresses (I originally used 10.0.0.1 + 10.0.0.2 and then 192.168.0.1 + 192.168.0.2).
None of these changed the behaviour of the cards.

Greenstead · #4 11-28-2002, 10:39 PM

OK, good luck getting your refund.

btw When I said you cannot disable DHCP in ICS it is correct. The DHCP disabled you see from Ipconfig means you disabled the DHCP client in the wireless NIC when you set the address manually. The DHCP service in ICS is still operating, it cannot be disabled in XP.

Unless you have a good reason to set IP addresses manually it is better to let the DHCP service allocate the addresses since it proves IP connectivity.

Good Luck.

DaveG · #5 11-29-2002, 03:25 AM

Is getting 169.x.x.x addresses a good reason? I was told it was. Novice here, so bear with me :-)

BTW, since I'm making an ad-hoc network and hence only using client devices, where does the DHCP server come from?

DaveG · #6 12-06-2002, 01:35 PM

Got my refund, I guess dabs.com agreed with my assessment!

The moral of the story for me is buy Actiontec at your own risk! I only say this because of the apparent lack of experience and or knowledge displayed to me by their technical support representatives. Perhaps I'm being libelous, but I'd be willing to stand up in court with copies of all the stupid e-mails I've had from them. They thought ICS was an advanced feature of their own WNIC's for heavens sake!!!

I've since bought Belkin, even though I'm still having some technical problems (USB related this time, the network connection itself is fine), I have been very impressed with the competence of their technical support staff. At least those guys know what they're talking about!

DaveG

kitesurf · #7 12-06-2002, 03:40 PM

In reply to your posts about the support from Actiontec, I've been fairly impressed with their support. I've just bought two Actiontec NIC's and had to call them to get my ad-hoc network up and running, and they were really helpful. I guess it's just luck of the draw ain't it. Actually - their support comes from the States, all calls to tech support are routed across the big pond.

No problems getting the ad-hoc network to work though. A couple of hours of tinkering around and hey presto!

DaveG · #8 12-06-2002, 04:52 PM

Actually yes, my first contact with them was on the phone and he was nice and helpful (and american, he even said 'have a nice day'!). You'd think they'd put somenoe of similar skill level on the e-mail support wouldn't you?

Talking of e-mail support, here's another stupid thing. On the Actiontec website you are invited to send in your technical queries to their technical support e-mail address. So I dutifully wrote out all my issues and sent the e-mail to the address shown on the site (actually by clicking the link on their page). I got a very quick response; telling me that I should fill out an online form! So, despite my bemusement, I did this, and got a very prompt reply (if not all that helpful). So I have to ask the question, if they have people sat waiting to reply to messages from their online support form, why aren't they answering the e-mails too? Surely the two sources have the same intent and content!

Further to that, I asked on e-mail if they could explain all the the advanced 802.11b settings (framentation, power level mode, rts/cts, etc) because since they couldn't help me, maybe the answer to my problem laid with those settings (which it didn't in the end btw). This was the what they replied to me with when I finally got them to say something vaguely helpful:
"This information has never been asked for before, we do not have the information you requested at our Technical Support center. Here is a link to the IEEE web site, It should have all of the information you are looking for in reguards ".
I find it disturbing that they couldn't explain the function of the advanced functions of 802.11b.

Perhaps I would have had better luck on the phone, but shouldn't all their communication channels offer the same level of technical expertise?

kitesurf · #9 12-09-2002, 09:51 AM

Well since replying to your post about the support from Actiontec, I've fiddling around with the settings on my two Actiontec NIC's to try and increase the througput of the two machines (see separate post). It would seem that we're both experiencing the same problem.

I have a laptop and desktop connected up and when I try and say copy a big file from one machine to another, the connection just dies on me and I get a message on the USB NIC (Desktop) telling me that it's unable to communicate with the device driver. I don't have this problem on the PCMCIA card that I have installed on my laptop though.

So it would seem there is a definite problem with the USB hardware. When I browse the net from the laptop (desktop has ICS enabled), no problems and no connections dying. It only ever seems to happen when you try and access files on the shared folder of the remote machine.

I gave Actiontec a call and I think I have to revise my original opinion of their support - the guy I spoke to was so unhelpful - he turned around and told me that this might be a problem because of Windows XP...??? eh? You can't just buff off a customer by saying it might be a problem with the OS and then leave it at that..

so I might be taking the same route and replacing hardware with something a bit better.

grrr