Curse

tasha · Jan 04, 2010, 03:15 PM // 15:15

My linksys gave up the ghost on Saturday and while its away being seen to (yay for warranty) I went to get a replacement to tie me over. My local store didn't have a great selection, but I got a Belkin Wireless Router & Modem. Get it home, set up, internet works great on the cable. I can surf, get into games etc and its all good. I went onto the wireless and something odd happens - some ports aren't open.

The game that shows this up best is Heroes of Newerth. With the laptop plugged into the router through a wire I can see all the games available to be played. Wirelessly though, theres nothing. No games, no one online even though I'm in a chat room with 100 people. Sure enough these are on different ports to those needed to enter chat and log in. Additional weirdness is that while I can browse the net on the PlayStation 3 wirelessly, I can't sign into the PlayStation Network. And sometimes, even though the light is on and it should be fine, I can't see the hub at all as a location to sign into.

When I called up Belkin the "engineer" seemed baffled as to why this would be happening. I consider myself someone of above average computer literacy (I make a living as a programmer) and I've never heard of a router where the accessibility of ports was different depending on connection, but as always I'm open to being educated. So I guess my question is this: is there a reason why ports would be different depending on connection? Or is the router just screwed? Either way its going back to the store on Wednesday when its replacement arrives (yay for nice friends lending you equipment).

Kattar · Jan 04, 2010, 03:43 PM // 15:43

You should be able to open the ports up in the router itself. That's the quick fix anyway.

As to why they're closed in the first place...I have no idea. Could be something security related (not wanting people that are accessing your wireless network without your knowledge to be able to run torrents, etc) or it could be to preserve bandwidth - some sort of traffic shaping built into the router.

They didn't really teach us why things happen in school, just how to fix them. Heh.

tasha · Jan 04, 2010, 03:54 PM // 15:54

Opening up the ports would be fine.... if the wireless didn't drop the connection every 1-2 minutes when I assign the laptop a static ip. Doesn't help either that there's no documentation on how to open up a port range, only examples with a single port.

Sounds like a lot of stuff at school really Kat :P

Kattar · Jan 04, 2010, 04:20 PM // 16:20

Don't assign a static IP then?

But seriously, the connection dropping could be anything from interference to the NIC card on your laptop. That one's a little harder to diagnose. I've never had a good experience with a Belkin router. I can't help with opening port ranges anymore than google can either. Sorry about that.

But it does sound like the whole thing is just not working correctly. The wireless acting as it does would be more than enough reason to take it back.

People always ask me why whatever problem they're dealing with occurs. The answer really doesn't matter as long as you can fix it. It's general either too complex or esoteric for them/me to understand anyway. Lol.

Hope you get your other router back soon.

Mustache Mayhem · Jan 04, 2010, 05:03 PM // 17:03

alot of the routers out on the market today are junk.. I'd get a linksys from this list here http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Supported_Devices

flash ddwrt into it and be done.. I run a wap unit myself- but any of the wrt's on that list should be fine (can usually get the right version off ebay for cheap).. turn that ghetto router into a 600 dollar unit =]

that belkin maybe on the list too, but honestly it's garbage.. and it's not he only router that will crash with too many incoming connects

tasha · Jan 04, 2010, 10:32 PM // 22:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mustache Mayhem

alot of the routers out on the market today are junk.. I'd get a linksys from this list here http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Supported_Devices

Thanks for the link, I'll give it a check when my friend's hardware arrives. After the issues with the Belkin we went searching through every affordable router I could go out and buy in the town and looking for problems with them. And nearly everything came back with a problem, which is why he's sending me his set up (router + WAP, only not in use cos he got cable rather than ADSL). Considering the parts I have knocking around I could probably build myself a modem/router and just use a WAP, but it seems a bit overkill while its just me in the house. Maybe when my other half moves in.

Kat: Don't worry about not being able to help. It slightly comforting that you can't. I agree about a reason not always being necessary but I'm one of those people that if something technical goes wrong I like to try and find out so I don't get blown off by some guy reading a script trying to get their company out of trouble. Or so I can fix it, either with a hammer or through code (messing around with capacitors and stuff isn't my thing, despite many MANY lectures at uni about it. Total black magic to me). But I can accept "its just broken".

Oh and the wireless on the laptop is fine. I'm using it right now to borrow a kind neighbour's network - HoN ports aren't open but at least I can play GW and get my modding done

It hasn't been a good month for technology in my house - Motherboard is back at supplier being looked at cos the sound has screwed itself, and my Guitar Hero drum kit has stopped working after not much use. Hoping this is the last of the breakages.

Kattar · Jan 05, 2010, 01:53 PM // 13:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by tasha

It slightly comforting that you can't.

Heh, I know what you mean there. It's kind of a validation that, "Yes, I didn't miss anything simple and I'm not slowly slipping into Alzheimer's. Yay."

I've forgotten so much of what we did at uni anyway. Need to go find those books again.

tasha · Jan 05, 2010, 02:00 PM // 14:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Katsumi

Heh, I know what you mean there. It's kind of a validation that, "Yes, I didn't miss anything simple and I'm not slowly slipping into Alzheimer's. Yay."

You been looking into my family history?! Stalker... <>

My mum recently "accidentally" threw out a load of my uni notes. Not that I think I'll be needing to solve complex stability equations in the near future (degree was in cybernetics &control systems) but it would have been good to keep.

Replacement router has arrived, shall be plugging that in later. Hope that's the end of the woes and I can get back to abusing the internet properly.