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[BrokeIt]

Hi,
A few months ago, I swapped out my venerable D-Link DI-524 router for a newer DIR-655 that I'd had for a bit but had not been using as a router. Ever since doing so, I've run into an annoyance with which I finally feel compelled to reach out for help.

From a fresh reboot, everything will be fine. But after a while, where a "while" can be anywhere from a few hours to a few days, my internet connection will slow to the point that it's almost unusable. This applies to wired connections as well as wireless. At that point, I've found that a simple release/renew in the router's "Tools" menu will temporarily correct the issue, but then it bogs down again after the aforementioned "while". And whether I release/renew, or do a full reboot of the router, the cycle basically repeats. Sometimes I'll have to hard reboot it, because if I let the connection get too bad, it will get to a point where any browser will take a half hour just to load the router's page.

I'm pretty sure it's the router and not the ISP, because I hadn't had this issue with the DI-524; and after running a large overnight data transfer with a machine connected directly to the cable modem, Speedtest didn't show any slowdown (at that point, Speedtest will usually show a major slowdown when going through the router, even if the network doesn't "feel" sluggish).

Here's a rundown of my network setup and my current router configuration.

Hardware version: B1, Firmware version: 2.03NA

My ISP is RoadRunner (Time Warner), which is a cable modem-based service.
I run an Amahi server that is directly wired to the router. I am running both a DHCP server and a DNS on that machine. As a consequence, I have "Enable DHCP Server" and "Enable DNS Relay" unchecked on the router's Setup->Network Settings page.

Connected directly to the DIR-655 are the Amahi server (Gigabit), a D-Link DGS-2208 switch, a TP-Link 100Mb switch, and a VOIP phone.

Connection Type:      DHCP Client
Cable Status:         Connected
Network Status:       Established
StreamEngine:         Disabled
Primary DNS Server:   192.168.0.5
Secondary DNS Server: 192.168.0.5
Advanced DNS:         Disabled

Thank you for any suggestions!

[FurryNutz]

Try this:
Turning a router into an AP.

[BrokeIt]

Try this:
Turning a router into an AP.

Thanks for the suggestion. But if I did that, how would I connect to the Internet? Neither the cable modem nor the Amahi server have multiple ethernet ports. The DIR-655 IS the host router to which the instructions refer.

Is the problem simply that the DIR-655 needs it to be "all or nothing"? That is, that if it's going to do any routing, it also needs to control address assignment? And if it doesn't have that responsibility, it needs to be stripped down to being a switch? If that's the case, I could disable DHCP on the Amahi server, and put it back to the DIR-655. I would lose a convenience feature or two of Amahi's, but they would be very minor losses if it would get my network back up to speed...

Thanks!

[FurryNutz]

Your working with 3 DHCP servers, your 2 Amahi's and the DIR-655. The DIR series routers are designed to be host routers with DHCP services and all the other features going. Some people can use them as APs if the DHCP and all other services are turned off and connected like a AP and Switch. These routers are generally used as the main host routers and everything else is connected to it with the responsibility connected to it. Use the routers in any other way is not supported by D-Link should something happen. I would recommend using the DIR-655 as the host router and use the DMZ for unfiltered, unprocessed connections.

What ISP Service do you have? Cable or DSL?
What ISP Modem do you have? Stand Alone or built in router?
What ISP Modem make and model do you have?

Turn off ALL QoS or Disable Traffic Shaping (DIR only) GameFuel (DGL only and if ON.) options. Advanced/QoS or Gamefuel.
Turn off Advanced DNS Services if you have this option under Setup/Internet/Manual.
Turn on DNS Relay under Setup/Networking. You may want to try to turn this off after filling in the DNS addresses under Setup/Internet/Manual.

Not sure if this will all work in your network environment.

[FurryNutz]

Any status on this? 

[BrokeIt]

Sorry to have taken awhile to get back to this. This time of year always gets a bit hectic. :-) Plus, I wanted to try some of the suggestions and see if they helped over any period of time. Unfortunately, I am still having the same issue.

First, I want to clarify the setup a bit. I only have the one Amahi server, not two. And I only had one device at a time set up to be the DHCP server. To re-iterate/elaborate on the ISP:
The service is RoadRunner; it's a cable service.
The modem is an Arris TM502G; it's a stand-alone telephony modem.

Anyway, I turned the DHCP server in the DIR-655 back ON, and turned DCHP OFF on the Amahi server. I am, however, still using the Amahi server as a DNS (meaning I still have the Amahi machine's IP address, which is statically set, set as the primary and secondary DNS in the DIR-655). QoS/Traffic Shaping are OFF, and Advanced DNS Services are also OFF.

I've tried leaving DNS relay OFF, and I've since tried turning it ON. In both cases, though, the result was the same as the initial problem. Some time after a fresh reboot of the DIR-655, my internet connection begins to slow to a crawl. The one bright point is that I haven't had as much of a problem bringing up web access on the DIR-655 itself since making it the DHCP server.

I haven't been doing much in the way of heavy WAN loads lately (i.e., no torrents of late), though I am somewhat demanding on the LAN (I use in-house remote desktop quite a bit). Not sure if there's more information that might help.

Thanks again for any suggestions!

[FurryNutz]

If you by passed this Amahi Server and let the 655 handled the DNS, do you still see slow downs with your clients?

[BrokeIt]

Short answer, yes, I still see the slowdown.

I changed the DNS servers on the DIR-655 to use the OpenDNS addresses, and for good measure, powered down the Amahi server. I rebooted the DIR-655, and as per usual, at first I was getting ~25Mb/s downstream throughput at speedtest. But after 18 hours or so, I'm getting even worse results than before: ~500kb/s instead of ~800kb/s at the low end with the Amahi server up.

I'm game to keep the Amahi server shut down a little longer if there are a few more things I might be able to try with the DIR-655 in comparative isolation?

Thanks!

[FurryNutz]

How are you speed testing, Wired is preferred. Try different servers on the speed test site as not all will have the same results.

All cables between the ISP modem, router and the test PC are in good working condition? CAT 6 is highly recommended.

I would try using ISP DNS to see if speed results differ from 3rd party DNS.

http://forums.dlink.com/index.php?topic=50682.0 Might try a different ISP modem. See various issues with Arris modems. Ensure the signal going into the ISP modem is to spec for the modem(s). If there are any t.v. line splitters before the ISP modem, these will cause signal attenuation and noise on the line. If you need to use one, ensure you use a GOOD quality one. Amplifiers only amplify the noise and don't help.

Test the DIR-655 at a friend, family or neighbors place to see if the problem follows.

[BrokeIt]

All of my speed testing so far has been on wired connections. One of the machines I've been testing on has a CAT6 connection to the router, one of them CAT5e. Before initially posting, I had gone through a couple of rounds of swapping cables (having read that suggestion elsewhere on the forums). The connection between the router and the cable modem is CAT6.

I'm actually having a surprising amount of difficulty finding correct DNS addresses for RoadRunner. All of the ones I've located online so far may be outdated, as they don't seem to work. I may need to give them a call to get them (*groan*). Just to see if it helps anything, I've switched for the moment from the OpenDNS addresses to the Google ones.

The change in ISP modem model may be a possibility, but that will also take some interaction with their technicians to set up. I have, in the recent past, had them check the signal levels going to the cable modem, and all seemed well. So I THINK I'm okay at least up to that point.

Testing the router at another house is out of the question until at least the end of the month (the only time in the near future I plan to be AT someone's house long enough to do it). But I may try it at that time...

[FurryNutz]

Give Google Name Bench a try. Nice little app that actually finds faster DNS addresses to use.
If you try it, connect your PC directly to the ISP Modem then run the app. Record what it finds, should be a couple to use. Write them down then reconnect the router and input those addresses manually in to Setup/Internet. At this point you can disable DSN relay as it won't be needed.

I would ask to see what RoadRunner allows as for modems, if they allow BYOM then I would recommend a Motorola SB 6 series stand alone modem. Great modems.

If you can get the time, i would recommend testing at a different place to see. Otherwise you could run down to the nearest electronic store with a refund policy and do a test with something different.

Keep us posted.

[BrokeIt]

I tried out NameBench, and its top scorer was the OpenDNS server that I started with when running directly into the modem. I tried it a second time going through the router after a fresh reboot, and it recommended Google's DNS, which I'd also tried. As having tried each of those as my DNS didn't changed the results appreciably, I'm thinking that the DNS settings are not really the issue here.

I got some more information on Time Warner's BYOM policies, and found that there are indeed some Motorola modems on their "approved" list. I'm leaning toward the SB6121, but probably won't pull the trigger on it for a few weeks yet (December is expensive enough as it is).

I've continued to tinker with other settings to see if there was any change. In particular, I tried disabling SPI, and tried switching NAT endpoint filtering down to "Endpoint Independent". Didn't see any change there, so I switched them back to defaults. Googling around, there's some discussion of overloaded IP connection tables as being an occasional culprit in router slowdowns. Any chance that's happening here? If so, are there any settings I can manipulate to try alleviating that (like shortening timeouts to be more aggressive about clearing it, etc.)?

Thanks again!

[FurryNutz]

I don't think there is a UI for clearing tables, The only thing would be to Factory reset the router. Turn off ALL devices accept for one wired PC to test with and set up the router from scratch and test. I would use default settings and default DNS from your ISP initailly to test. Set up a reserved IP address for the one PC. Use different locations on speedtest.net to test your speed. Should be on or near what your paying for, depending on time of day and traffic hours.

Another possible cause could be that your neighborhood could have alot of other users online as well. One thing that is effected on Cable system unlike DSL. 

Ya, holidays are here. Might ask Santa for a new modem. 

[BrokeIt]

Not sure why I hadn't done that before, but thank you for the suggestion of the factory reset! Once it came back up, it seemed to spend some time calibrating itself or something (web page said something to that effect), which I had never seen before.

After that, I manually re-adjusted the settings I felt I needed (DNS, wireless, and video conference firewall port opening), but no more. Two days later, I've seen no dropoff in performance, including today's abuse of simultaneous VoIP, video conferencing, BitTorrenting, and MMO playing (in various places throughout the house). That's the first time I've seen that kind of a load not cause problems since I put the DIR-655 in as the router, soo...

I'm going to go ahead and declare victory! Thanks very much for all the help!

[FurryNutz]

Glad it's working well. I recommend that if you have the router configured to your needs, save off the routers configuration to file under Tools/System.

Enjoy.