5 GHz connection dropping out

[#1]

Thanks for the detailed response tonyb55

I know the line speed that Plusnet is supplying to my house is around 79Mb.

I can get close to 70Mb on 2.4GHz sometimes on particular devices which lines up with what you've explained in regards to the different antennas in different devices.

On 5GHz I can get nearly my max line speed on any device and I'm assuming that is also down to antennas in both the devices and router and also less interference.

So my point was only really that we should all be able to use 5GHz all the time and it shouldn't be faulty as it gives a better WiFi speed on some devices.  Hope I've explained that a bit better!

[#2]

@Sengoku thanks for that - yeah that's what I figured will happen with me as well if I have this device replaced.

Another update - after I restarted the router this afternoon to re-establish the 5ghz connections, I went out at around 4pm and returned home at 9pm. Sometime between then yet again the 5ghz connection has dropped in exactly the same way as previous - my phone will only partially connect to it, laptop does the same, and the other devices in the house have shifted to 2.4ghz.

I set my laptop to prefer 2.4ghz so I could quickly get to the web admin panel, and sure enough a repeat of the same reboot process fixes the problem. Sometimes I can just change the channel on 5ghz and re-apply - this usually fixes it in the short term.

But the fact it now seems to be only fixing it for a number of hours before failing again is really not good. As it causes some of the devices in the house an issue, I can't be repeating this process on a daily basis. So for the rest of the weekend, i've disabled 5ghz entirely and will see how it goes on 2.4ghz, and will look to come up with an alternative solution early next week. I would prefer 5ghz availability.

It's looking ever more likely that I will need to spend some money on another router/modem, as this one is clearly experiencing a major fault if it cannot operate for more than a day on 5ghz without failing. Shame! Hopefully Plusnet are taking this issue seriously enough to push for a software fix in the near future.

[#3]

Just to be clear when you say it seems to be software not hardware you mean the firmware (software on the chip) inside the router?

If you are offered another router then take it and prove it is the case.
I didn't take the offer up and wish I had just to prove it. But who knows, you may get a different revision that doesn't have issues!
But since this was an issue when this unit was offered by BT and remains an issue then I doubt it will get sorted.
I'm not a stats person but I would hazzard a guess that for every one person that has come to the forums on this issue there is at least another 10 that just haven't noticed due to the router being in default setup.

[#4]

No that is a fair point, I will still report it to Plusnet and request a replacement, just on the off chance I do receive a router which is a different revision. But yes my feeling was that we are dealing with a firmware issue, rather than a physical failure on the chip itself that handles the 5ghz connection. Unless of course some units use components from different manufacturers, and some happen to be more susceptible to these issues.

But I agree, the issue has been going on for a while, so we might be waiting a while for a fix.

In the meantime, I'll request a replacement anyway, but seeing as the the BT Smart Hub 6 is supposed to be superior and available at quite reasonable prices on eBay, I am tempted to go down that route for an overall improved experience.

[#5]

It's pretty obvious that it's a firmware issue as downgrading the firmware fixes the issue. The question is : are all variants of the router affected by this firmware bug or is it only specific board versions that have it.

[#6]

I can help you with that @SteveA. I have three of these routers which I've acquired from Plusenet over the years. They look identical on the outside but have different hardware revisions and also different features within the administration pages. All three of these routers are on .263 and all three are crippled by this 5ghz bug.

[#7]

I have 2 accounts with the same router but a year between the dates/models and both suffer from the same issue.
On the one I have turned wifi off and run it through a Sonicwall and get far better wifi.

For my home one I am still trying

[#8]

Another update from me.

It is a long time since I started this thread and not much seems to have happened towards finding a solution. It's probably time for a summary of what has happened from my point of view.

More and more people seem to be reporting the problem on this thread and other threads on the forum. As other people have said, I also think that for every person that does report the problem there are 10+ who either don't report it or simply don't realise they have the issue & put it down to slow WiFi. Many of the Plusnet staff who respond on here still seem to be in complete denial about the issue and suggest things that the affected customer should try. It's hard to know if this is because they have been told to treat the matter in this way or whether they simply are unable to relate 100s of identical reports. Either way it doesn't make Plusnet look good. Also, as forum users, we have been given no indication of how many customers have reported the issue via phone or chat.

I got fed up with the way I was being treated and raised a formal complaint. After that achieved nothing I raised it with the Ombudsman. As I have stated on here before, the Ombudsman is part funded by Plusnet, (but their decisions are said to not be influenced by that). They didn't find Plusnet at fault for the issue except for some Customer Service failings in handling my complaint. As I was still unhappy with this I then reported the issue to Ofcom who, as far as I know, are now monitoring this problem and this thread.

I have also had some dealings with Bob Pullen from Plusnet who seems to be the person trying to resolve this issue.

I can assure you from what I have been told that both Plusnet and Sagemcom are aware of problems with the current firmware but seem unable to identify and correct them. I personally  don't think that they are putting anywhere near enough effort into resolving this and suspect that is why staff on the forum seem less willing to admit there is a known problem.

I have been in touch with Bob Pullen recently via PM and will tomorrow be putting my Hub One back in service and trying to recreate the problem. I hope to be able to do this reasonably quickly after hopefully having already found what causes it in my case. I will then leave the router in that state and notify Bob so that Plusnet and Sagemcom can remotely access my router to download some diagnostic information.

That is the plan. I have been trying to help Plusnet since I started this thread. I am doing it purely to prove that Plusnet introduced a fault into the firmware and to get that fixed for everyone. I do not believe that any customers should be forced to buy their own third party router to overcome a failing of Plusnet. There are even instances on here where out of contract customers have been offered a new Hub One for £100 to solve the problem when clearly it won't once the firmware updates. That has been proved by some of you who have received free replacement routers. That is why as well as trying to help Plusnet I have continued to escalate my complaints about this.

My Hub One has been out of service because I used my award from the Ombudsman to buy a BT HH6 to improve reliability in the absence of any hint of a fix from Plusnet. Hopefully now they can start to make some progress on this, I will be doing my best to help them if they stick to their part in the plan.

I will keep you posted!

[#9]

@NigeBoy 

Hi there, thanks a lot for posting this update, that is really helpful. We are all very grateful of the testing you have done so far and your willingness to help Plusnet. I totally agree that customers shouldn't end up in a position where they feel that in order to resolve their issues, they have to buy their own router to overcome what is a clearly a failing of the Plusnet provided router.

Will be very interested to hear what the findings are once you put the hub back into service, hopefully as you have a dialog open with Bob Pullen you will be able to get Plusnet and/or Sagemcom connected to pull any necessary diagnostics.

Like you, after reading a lot of posts across the forum and this thread, I found it quite strange that no clear progress has been made on the issue since it was originally reported and that they are unable to replicate it. I think Plusnet really need to put some resource into resolving this - the problem isn't going to go away by itself, and like you said, it doesn't make Plusnet look good at all.

[#10]

Glad I found this thread. Have had Plusnet for a couple of months replacing TalkTalk. Could never get the 5GHz to work - kept getting password error. Tried a couple of times to reset the wifi password etc. But gave up. Tried again today - resetting password and channel and got connected. Thought I’d cracked it but then it dropped broadband connection on 5GHz while 2.5GHz was working fine (streaming Andy Murray match on Prime Video). Also the problem of connecting reappeared on my iPhone and iPad - thought I was going mad but then did a search and found this thread. Restored my sanity. Thanks.

[#11]

Hi everyone.  Just to give a little update, it has been over a week with no problems on either 2.4GHz or 5GHz band.  The only thing I'd changed (apart from the usual things like WiFi passwords and SSID names) is increasing the DHCP lease from 1 day to the maximum of 21 days.

Not sure if this will help anyone else but thought it would be worth a try.  So to summarise, set the DHCP leases to expire after 21 days and then restart the router.  

[#12]

Cool, thanks for the update. I wonder if the problem will resurface when the leases start to expire. I will also give it a try when I get a moment, and see if anything changes. My 5ghz was failing within a matter of hours, although I didn't check the lease expiry on all my devices at the time.

[#13]

I thought about what would happen once the leases expire too but then thought, it wouldn't be too bad hitting restart every 20 or so days rather than every 2-3 days

Also I was probably a little too quick with my earlier message, I may have made some other changes.  I think I may have set the 5GHz channel instead of leaving it on smart select (or whatever it's called).  I'll double check what my settings are when I get home later this evening and let you know what I've done.  Thinking about it more, I think I might have set the channels on both 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands and set the lease expiry to 21 days.

Will post the details later 👍

[#14]

Although I haven't played with the lease time, I did try setting a manual channel on 5ghz but it still causes the dropout issue everyone is seeing here.

[#15]

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@movisman wrote:

Although I haven't played with the lease time, I did try setting a manual channel on 5ghz but it still causes the dropout issue everyone is seeing here.

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Yep, I'm the same as you.  Setting a manual channel only worked for a little while.  This is the first time that its remained reliable and the only additional change was the DHCP expiry time.

Having said all this, I'll bet later this afternoon I'm going to get an 'internet is being funny again' message from the wife!