D-Link Forums
The Graveyard - Products No Longer Supported => Routers / COVR => DGL-4500 => Topic started by: BruceD on December 08, 2010, 09:30:47 AM
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I have had the DGL-4500 for about a month now, and not a day goes by that it doesn't reboot itself. In fact most days it reboots multiple times per day. I have Comcast cable using a Linksys cable modem and I can confirm that on each reboot of the DGL-4500...the cable modem is still passing traffic as a connected laptop (I placed a switch between the router and modem as a test) still remains online. The firmware version is 1.23NA. Nothing in the logs tell me what may be going on. I have turned off just about everything I can that I would suspect puts the router through additional processing (workload) and nothing works. Disabling the dynamic defrag seem to help...though this may simply be my perception since I want something to work.
I work from my home during the day and am hard-wired to the router, but it still resets. It seems to be worse during VPN sessions, VIOP calls, or GoToMeeting sessions...I suspect heavy traffic usage. Another heavy traffic example...we cannot watch a full length movie on Netflix wether on a PC (hard-wired or wireless) or a wirelessly connected Xbox without it rebooting. If my family is home and connected via wireless, it reboots at least once an hour (often more), wether I am using any of the hard-wired PC's or not.
I purchased the router from Newegg and the user ratings warned of such issues with the router. I have also found other sites with user complaints about the same issue. When is D-Link going to provide us with a fix to this issue. My previous DGL-4300 ran fine for more than 3 years under the exact same conditions without issue, until lightning took it out. The reboot issue is well documented and a firmware update is obvious, but why haven't we seen one?
A rebooting router is utterly worthless to me and I need an answer or time frame. Otherwise, it is time to throw the router away and make another purchase, presumably not D-Link.
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I can understand your frustrations. There were issues with random resets and hangs in v1.21 and those issues were fixed in v1.22 and remain fixed in v1.23.
Let see if we can help you figure this out.
Lets verify that you have v1.23 please on the Device Status page. Let us know the version. Was this the version that was loaded already?
How often does the 4500 reset?
How are you connecting to the 4500? Wired or wireless?
If you have done any configurations to the 4500, please save off the current configuration to file.
Let's shut down the cable modem and 4500. Turn off and Disconnect all devices accept for one PC that your going to use here. I'd like you to make sure the cable between the modem and 4500 is in good working order. Lets try a different one to be sure. Lets connect a wired PC to the 4500 for now.
Turn on the cable modem. And let it do it's thing.
You an turn on the 4500 log in to the web page and perform the full factory reset under Tools/System/Restore Factory Defaults. Let the 4500 reset.
I'd like for you to run some tests and let us know if you see any issues. We need to see if this is happening with default settings. So don't change any settings right now. Do a Speed check then stream some video to this connected PC.
I'd like you to review the gaming and gamefuel information sticky (not the PlayStation one) for some good info on how to set up the xbox. These are the same settings I use and others use and they work well. Make sure you follow them precisely if you do use them. Lets make sure the 4500 is working well first. I feel there is a configuration issue right now thus might be causing the resets.
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The router came with 1.21NA and rebooted within an hour of plugging it in so I updated the firmware. As I mentioned in the first post...the router now has 1.23NA that is dated 2010/04/15.
I would guess the router resets from 4 to 10 times per day.
During the day, 1 PC hard-wired to the router. Like today, with 2 reboots in the last 4 hours and no wireless connections. Add a wireless connection and it will reboot much more.
The router is running defaults, less one gaming rule for a single Xbox. These settings for the Xbox were taken from this forums sticky on setting up the Xbox.
The ethernet cable between the moden and router has already been replaced. No change.
I have done the factory reset, and started from scratch a few times already, none have remedied the problem.
I also tried another Linksys cable modem...my neighbor has the exact same model, and it has made no difference. I thought it may be the problem. I have reset the router to factory defaults and noted the time. I will post when the time the router reboots while using a single PC wired to the router with no wireless connections.
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Another thing to make sure, just because the cable modem is send some traffic doen't mean it's getting a good signal and transferring bad data to the router. Make sure that splitters on the cable line going to the modem are few to none. None being preferred. You can check the status of your cable modem and the logs for any obvious disconnections by going to 192.168.100.1 I believe for your cable modem as I had one of those up until recently. You should see some logs for the modem. You can call and ask your ISP and talk to a tech and see if they notice any problems or disconnects on the Modems WAN side going to there servers. They can see all on the cable modem. Let us know how it goes.
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Ok, I might shut off the wireless for now if you can do with out for a while. One thing you can do as a test, is can you take the 4500 router to your friends house and test there as well, if the problem travels then we can really say there is something at the 4500 thats not working.
Yes, v1.21 has the reset and hang issue and when you loaded v1.23 it should have resolved it. What HW version is this 4500? A1 or A2? I have A1. Look for this on the botom sticker.
One thing I'd like to try is to load the FW again and see. There is a better way to load and it might help. I've learned that doing a factory reset first, load the FW bin file, then do one final factory reset again after the upgrade ensures the FW is seated and everything is fully set.
Hope we can narrow down the issue for you. I know you'd like to be using it rather than trying to fix it. LOL.
The router came with 1.21NA and rebooted within an hour of plugging it in so I updated the firmware. As I mentioned in the first post...the router now has 1.23NA that is dated 2010/04/15.
I would guess the router resets from 4 to 10 times per day.
During the day, 1 PC hard-wired to the router. Like today, with 2 reboots in the last 4 hours and no wireless connections. Add a wireless connection and it will reboot much more.
The router is running defaults, less one gaming rule for a single Xbox. These settings for the Xbox were taken from this forums sticky on setting up the Xbox.
The ethernet cable between the moden and router has already been replaced. No change.
I have done the factory reset, and started from scratch a few times already, none have remedied the problem.
I also tried another Linksys cable modem...my neighbor has the exact same model, and it has made no difference. I thought it may be the problem. I have reset the router to factory defaults and noted the time. I will post when the time the router reboots while using a single PC wired to the router with no wireless connections.
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Just a quick update. Yesterday after a factory reset...and no other changes to the router it rebooted on me 2 more times and once this morning. First...router was up for about 1.5 hours when it reset during a VOIP call. Only 1 wired PC using the router at that time. About 50 minutes after the disconnected VOIP call, I was connected to a VPN and it reset. However, I got back into the VPN and was in for another 2/2.5 hours and it was fine. I did not reconnect any wireless devices last night.
This morning...again only 1 PC wired to the router...reset after about the first 40 minutes working across a VPN, but has been fine since. More than 4.5 hours on the VPN since the last reset. I also ran a 20 minute Skype video call to my brother and it remained up. So far today...1 reset.
All of today and last night the radio was enabled, but no devices were connected. I will turn off the radio for the rest of the day and see what happens.
The hardware version is A2.
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Thanks for the update. This is interesting that the resets are getting more far appart. Have you configured anything on the 4500 for VPN after the factory or your just using all default settings?
A2...Over the years have seen a bit more issues with A2 vs A1.
Is WISH enabled? If it is, disable it as well. Let us know if you notice anything.
I think the next step after all this would be to do a re load of the v1.23 FW.
If you decide to do this, use the following process:
Do a Factory reset on the 4500 and let it come to ready.
Load the FW .bin file using the routers web page and let it upgrade and come to ready.
Do another Factory reset on the 4500 and let it come to ready.
Test with default settings.
After this, if the router is resetting still, is there a friend you can take this router to and put on his system and test for a bit? If you can and it's doing the same thing there. I would call DLink, tell them the steps taken and get an RMA, if not, then I guess a return to place of purchase is the last resort.
I do hope it works though.
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Ran router with disabled radios on Friday. 2 resets over more than 11 hours of use with 1 wired PC. All resets were while I was on a VPN. I have not modified any settings since the factory reset. I did notice that the router does not keep the date/time settings on each reset.
Enabled radios this morning, and let my kids (2) connect their PC's, it reset in about 25 minutes. And again about an hour later (might have been a little longer). The router obviously has an issue. At no time does the router seem to get hot, for that matter not even warm to the touch. Perhaps it is firmware or even an ASIC, but nevertheless it should not hard reset itself.
Your heading me down the path of a configuration issue, when setting the included configuration options should not cause such an event. I need an answer as to what is being done, if anything, to resolve this well documented issue. If there is no new firmware close to completion, then just let me know. I can move on and throw the router away and make a new purchase.
Please answer the question...are we going to see a new firmware update soon that may help with this issue?
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Ran router with disabled radios on Friday. 2 resets over more than 11 hours of use with 1 wired PC. All resets were while I was on a VPN. I have not modified any settings since the factory reset. I did notice that the router does not keep the date/time settings on each reset.
You say you experienced all resets while on VPN. Does the router reset if your not using VPN? Any chance you can test this router out at a friends network? I know you mentioned changing out the cable modem from your neighbor however I'd like to see if this router would work on his network if possible. On your cable system are there any splitters on the line by chance? Having any splitters on the line will reduce the signal level to the cable modem.
Enabled radios this morning, and let my kids (2) connect their PC's, it reset in about 25 minutes. And again about an hour later (might have been a little longer). The router obviously has an issue. At no time does the router seem to get hot, for that matter not even warm to the touch. Perhaps it is firmware or even an ASIC, but nevertheless it should not hard reset itself.
You could try and reload the FW and see if this might resolve the issue. I would do a factory reset of the router, upload the updated .bin file. Do one more factory reset then test again.
Your heading me down the path of a configuration issue, when setting the included configuration options should not cause such an event. I need an answer as to what is being done, if anything, to resolve this well documented issue. If there is no new firmware close to completion, then just let me know. I can move on and throw the router away and make a new purchase.
Please answer the question...are we going to see a new firmware update soon that may help with this issue?
As for seeing a new build of FW, I don't have this kind of information. I presume that the last build of FW was v1.23. Even though this issue is documented here in the forums, this issue may not be solved by FW as there probably are other factors that are contributing to what you are experiencing. I would recommend that you give a different router a try and if you don't see any issues with that router, then I would call up DLink and tell them all that you have done and see if they can present you with other options. There could be just something wrong with the router which is a HW issue and could be easily remedied by an RMA. Let us know what happens.
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The reset is not specific to a VPN connection. Once my kids were back on their PC's over the weekend it reset 9 times on Sunday. Possibly more...I counted 6...but my kids were on their PC's longer than I was and said it reset 3 more times. Both were connected through a wireless connection while I was doing some gaming...again wired to the device. At one point my wife was also connected through a wireless (3 wireless connections at once) connection, which caused 2 resets in a matter of 10 minutes.
Thank you for your time and effort. But I don't want to waste anymore time, yours or mine, on this matter. I have the answer I need.
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Ok, I wish we could have done more. Hope that you find a better experience with the next router. Let us know what the results are.
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The reset is not specific to a VPN connection. Once my kids were back on their PC's over the weekend it reset 9 times on Sunday. Possibly more...I counted 6...but my kids were on their PC's longer than I was and said it reset 3 more times. Both were connected through a wireless connection while I was doing some gaming...again wired to the device. At one point my wife was also connected through a wireless (3 wireless connections at once) connection, which caused 2 resets in a matter of 10 minutes.
Thank you for your time and effort. But I don't want to waste anymore time, yours or mine, on this matter. I have the answer I need.
Before you give up roll your f/w back to 1.21 then use the f/w available search to roll that back to 1.12 and then try the 1.12-1.16b and see if it behaves any better. I have an a2 on 1.16b and it does pretty good but my old a1 on 1.21 is a paperweight. Perhaps one day I will find it, unbox it and roll the fw back.
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My DGL 4500 runs great, I used to have issues but I got a replacement unit. Now it works wonderfully. This is one of the best router I have ever owned in my life. Try getting a replacement return the one you own or call D link if you are still under warranty. I was going to recommend you to Factory Default it but you have already done that. Try and disable all of your logs and see if you get less restarts.
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Chris
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I've been noticing some sort of restart on my DGL-4500. My laptop will report the wireless connection lost and when I look across the room at the router, I can see that the display on the unit is lit up. Shortly after that the WiFi connection is reestablished.
I've looked at the status and see a "Connection Up Time" that seems to correspond to this. Does this indicate a reboot or some other kind of reset? I looked for an indication of router up time and could not find it.
I have noticed this happening a couple times daily.
thanks,
hank
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What firmware version is loaded?
What wireless mode are you using?
What hardware version is it? A1 or A2?
What other wireless devices do you have?
Any other wireless routers in the area?
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Thanks for the reply.
What firmware version is loaded?
1.23NA
What wireless mode are you using?
N Only
What hardware version is it? A1 or A2?
A2
What other wireless devices do you have?
Cordless phone (2.4GHz)
Any other wireless routers in the area?
Yes, my laptop lists 6 other APs.
After purchase I updated firmware to 1.23NA. I don't recall why but I think there was a problem with the firmware it shipped with. The router itself insisted it was running the most current firmware but I found 1.23NA on D-link's support site and it was obviously more recent.
It just restarted again. (Connections dropped, panel on the router lit up.) When it came back up I checked the status page and it reported 27 seconds for "Connection Up Time"
I have several laptops using WiFi, a Two Droid Xs also on WiFi and a printer, two desktops and PS3 on wired connections.
thanks,
hank
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You mention that you have a house cordless phone at 2.4Ghz..Anyone on the phone during this time frame when the router restarts? I've seen this happen before. What happens if you shut off the cordless phone for a while for testing?
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You mention that you have a house cordless phone at 2.4Ghz..Anyone on the phone during this time frame when the router restarts? I've seen this happen before. What happens if you shut off the cordless phone for a while for testing?
The phone has not been in use any of the times I've seen a restart. The next time I see a restart, I'll disconnect the phone to see if it makes a difference. At the moment it has run overnight w/out restarting.
thanks,
hank
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The router was having a reboot-fest tonight, not often running for more than 1/2 hour before restarting.
I removed power from my phone to see if it would make a difference. It's still rebooting.
I noticed that three of the times it rebooted were when either my wife or I closed the lid on our laptops, causing them to suspend. It seems that a device going away can cause a problem for the router. I'm pretty sure that the laptops unload the driver modules prior to suspension. (Both are running Linux.) I have no idea if they do any sort of orderly shutdown of the association to the AP or whether such a thing is normally done.
I have yet to see uptime of over about 12 hours since I have been dealing with this problem.
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Well I believe that the router shouldn't be restarting if someone shuts off a device or closes the lid on the laptops.
What is your ISP service? DSL or cable?
Does the restart effect a connections while others are online?
Are you using DCHP for your device addressing? What happens if you use Static IP reservations?
Is Advanced DNS service enabled?
Is WLAN Partition enabled or disabled. I believe it should be disabled along with SHORT GI.
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I saw the router panel light light up and looked over at my wife to see setting her laptop aside. So that's a repeating pattern.
We have cable Internet.
The restart affects wireless and wired connections.
I am using DHCP with most hosts getting reserved addresses.
I turned off Advanced DNS. It seemed like it redirected when I mistyped a URL and I did not care for that.
WLAN Partition was already off.
Short GI was on and I turned it off.
WMM Enable was on and I turned it off. (I don't think I need it.)
There is a checkbox for "Extra Wireless Protection" I can't find that in the PDF manual so I left it alone.
I've also disabled WISH.
thanks,
hank
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Ok, Im wondering if your seeing any restarts if the WiFi is disabled for a test. Can you wire up the devices for short term and just leave off the WiFi for a while. See any restarts then? Trying to see if restarts are being caused by WiFi or not.
Make sure your getting Primary and 2ndary DNS in Basic/Internet/Manual after turning off Advanced DNS Service.
You can turn off Extra Wireless Protection.
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Hank the router shouldn't reboot when a pc connects/disconnects from the router regardless of wired/wireless connection. If that unit is still under warranty I'd rma it and if you just bought it I'd take it back to the store.
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Hank the router shouldn't reboot when a pc connects/disconnects from the router regardless of wired/wireless connection. If that unit is still under warranty I'd rma it and if you just bought it I'd take it back to the store.
I think you're right and I'm not convinced that replacing it would gain me anything. If I turn off most of the features, it stays up. However that seems to result in reduced bandwidth. Maybe that's a result of allowing N+G. My Eee Pc seems not capable of connecting when the DGL-45000 is set to N only.
However this is moot at this point. I have enrolled in the SamKnows program to test my ISP and I have just received a Netgear router which they provide. It turned out to be more than expected as it supports Gigabit Ethernet and 802.11n, so I've swapped it in for the DGL-4500 and will see how it works. the build quality does not come close to the DGL-4500, but time will tell if it works as well.
FurryNutz,
Thanks for your help with this. I paid a premium price for this piece of equipment expecting that that would buy maximum performance within the limits of the various standards. Performance of the unit was subpar and I suspect that the firmware is pretty buggy. The last suggestion would have met with serious pushback from me. The whole point of having a wireless router is to avoid stringing Cat 5 around the house.
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I think you're right and I'm not convinced that replacing it would gain me anything. If I turn off most of the features, it stays up. However that seems to result in reduced bandwidth. Maybe that's a result of allowing N+G. My Eee Pc seems not capable of connecting when the DGL-45000 is set to N only.
However this is moot at this point. I have enrolled in the SamKnows program to test my ISP and I have just received a Netgear router which they provide. It turned out to be more than expected as it supports Gigabit Ethernet and 802.11n, so I've swapped it in for the DGL-4500 and will see how it works. the build quality does not come close to the DGL-4500, but time will tell if it works as well.
FurryNutz,
Thanks for your help with this. I paid a premium price for this piece of equipment expecting that that would buy maximum performance within the limits of the various standards. Performance of the unit was subpar and I suspect that the firmware is pretty buggy. The last suggestion would have met with serious pushback from me. The whole point of having a wireless router is to avoid stringing Cat 5 around the house.
The reason I had mentioned turning off WiFi was only to see if the router was doing the same thing or not AS A TEST only. This was not meant to be a last resort. I do understand that you are frustrated that your unit is not working as expected. I do believe there are possible other issues surrounding your unit. Testing a different router will help narrow your issue down. I do believe that if your 4500 seems to be the cause then I would contact DLink and RMA it. There have been a few versions of FW that some of us feel that were not built well. Mainly v1.21. I'm curious after you bought yours, why did you upgrade it? Was there an issue then? I'm currently running v1.23 at do not experience these issues. However I we have different HW versions. Makes me wonder if A2's are more fussy then A1's. ???
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I think this must be a cable issue.
I had DSL with this router and never had a single issue.
But I just switched to cable Saturday and had a restart about an hour ago. I'll monitor it to see if it was just a fluke.
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What are the logs saying during that time frame of the restart?
I presume you are using the Motorola SB 6120? If so, you can look at its logs and see if you notice anything around those time frames of the restarts. Make sure your primary and 2ndary DNS IP addresses are being filled in under Basic/Internet/Manual. Turn off Advanced DNS Service.
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What are the logs saying during that time frame of the restart?
I presume you are using the Motorola SB 6120? If so, you can look at its logs and see if you notice anything around those time frames of the restarts. Make sure your primary and 2ndary DNS IP addresses are being filled in under Basic/Internet/Manual. Turn off Advanced DNS Service.
Advanced DNS Service is off BUT I have no 2ndary DNS IP addresses! Where do I find them? ipconfig/all?
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Go into the routers web page and look under Status/Device Info/Wan section. Copy and paste those addresses into the Basic/Internet/Manual settings.
Make sure DNS relay is ON.
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Thanks Furry! Done except for DNS relay.....I can't find it. :(
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Basic/Network Settings
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Thank you Furry. It's enabled and restarted.
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OK, now the waiting game. LOL
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I'm confident your wisdom will see us through!
Now that I think about it, on Saturday when I switched from my DSL modem, I could have sworn that it found those DNS 1 and 2 addresses then I reset the router to default and they were no longer there. I wonder if the addresses I was seeing was from my DSL settings. I dunno. :-\
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One this I notice, some times they fill in, sometimes they don't.
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So far so good!
Still good. (Updated 2/18/11) Must have been those 2ndary DNS addresses.
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Good to hear. Hope you enjoy it. I love mine. :P
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Thanks brother! ;D
Hey I'm still waiting on that RECEIVE light to turn blue. I have a CAT5E cable connecting the router and modem. Is that good enough?
BTW, I just realized that I totally hijacked BruceD's thread. Sorry Bruce! :-[
I think Bruce was disgruntled with his issues and was buying a different router, right? So, he probably doesn't care. Thank you, Bruce.
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ya thats fine. Just so you understand, the router doesn't effect how the Modem interacts with the ISP. The ISP will do any FW updates that they see fit. The router just sends and receives the data. I use a 1ft cable between them.
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Ahh, of course! Duh! I didn't think it through. :-[
Funny you should say that, I JUST TODAY bought both a 1ft. and 2ft. CAT5e cable from Lowe's for that very reason! The 1 ft. was a little snug so the 2ft. one replaced it. Before I had a 6 or 12 foot one rolled up. Talk about overkill, but it was all I had.
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Good to hear. Now wait till the day you want Cat 6 or 7. ;D