4-2-15:
Our internet router abruptly dies; I go shopping for a replacement

BACK to Dead USB ports and/or flash drives; signing up for cloud storage; incorrect time/date-keeping on my Windows PC; and severe eye strain...

On 4-2-15 our internet router abruptly died. It'd worked fine for maybe 2-3 years prior to that, despite being relatively old tech, and cheap (it was a TRENDnet). As net outages for us here have usually overwhelmingly been due to our ISP flaking out, rather than our in-house gear, I naturally figured the problem was with them at first. So I did the standard reboot of the whole LAN, including the cable modem. When that didn't work, and I found a close neighbor had no outage on her connection to the ISP, I called our internet provider.

I was surprised to get a very clever robot troubleshooter with a nice feminine voice, which actually worked pretty well for quite a ways into the procedure (a lot like you'd expect the vocal computer on the TV show Star Trek: Next Generation to do), before I needed to be handed off to a live human being. The human support person was a woman, and very professional and helpful, and after some gymnastics on my part (I had to repeatedly fiddle with equipment on three different floors to do all this), we finally ascertained that my router had died.

Being pretty savvy on these matters myself, I could have determined this on my own-- but it was just so unexpected that I didn't try it before calling, since, as I said before, something like 99% of the time the problem has been on our ISP's end, rather than ours, in past experience.

Ugh! Without the router, our entire LAN, wired and wireless, was dead, leaving the only internet access available to be had on an old and slow Apple iMac, which just happened to be parked only two feet away from the cable modem, so it could be connected directly.

The modern Mac OS X is a pain for me to use for stuff like product reviews Googling and internet shopping. So I definitely wanted to avoid that if at all possible.

From past experience I was sure that there'd not only be no low cost routers at local brick and mortar establishments, but that there'd also be no high quality ones, either. Or the worst of all worlds. Yuck! Walmart was the main local source, and for lots of computing and networking gear they seem to prefer to carry items which tend to get poor reviews online, and then charge lots more for them than they'd cost you at Amazon or Newegg. A visit to our local Walmart confirmed that this was still true.

But waiting even a day or two for an expedited shipment from an online vendor would be downright painful for us here-- and especially for me, since I use the net heavily in my work efforts, plus use stuff like Pandora on Roku to facilitate my workout sessions.

Fortunately, someone jogged my memory, and I recalled we had a couple of old spare routers in storage (I keep old gear of all sorts forever, and sometimes it proves useful). The TRENDnet was completely dead though-- so there was no way to hobble around on it for a while, at all.

I still had the original Linksys router we maybe installed in the mid-1990s, and ran until just a few years ago, replacing it with the much newer TRENDnet. I replaced the Linksys because for some reason it'd begun forcing me to manually reboot the entire LAN every time someone left or arrived carrying a different wireless device (like cell phones or gaming appliances). Ugh! Basically I think its ancient software just couldn't handle newer stuff very well.

I definitely didn't want to have to be rebooting the LAN several times a day again, even if I only had to do that until we had a new router.

The other old spare router was a Belkin my sister's friend had given us, when he'd replaced it with another in his own network. He'd given it to us to replace our wireless router/switch, with which we'd had some issues, but I'd never gotten around to actually switching them out (the reason was I Googled it when considering the switch out, and found the Belkin had sufficient problems of its own to make any gains from a switch possibly be negligible). However, it definitely looked like time for it to be plugged in now!

I did, and it worked-- sort of. Like the old Linksys, it seemed to have problems with some newer stuff like many Roku channels and some iPhone apps. It also strangled on some modern web sites. So essentially we could only get basic web surfing on my Windows 7 PC and a couple tablets, and no Netflix or Pandora on our Rokus. And in the web surfing, it was like some web sites were censored or banned: we just couldn't see them most of the time. Like Imgur. And what web sites did work, were often slow or glitchy.

But thankfully I could use Google and Amazon all right. And I researched the best deals in good routers (since, as usual, we're pinched for money here, and who wants any more hassle than necessary anyway?).

I polled the others in the household, and found they were comfortable with a week's wait for a new router: so apparently I'd be the one to suffer the most. It also helped that we weren't due to have any extra family members visiting (as such members usually require lots of internet access, with multiple devices).

My heavily Pandora-aided workouts were the worst part for me, since I now had to use a local rural radio station, or ancient CD of Fleetwood Mac: Rumours to get by on music-wise (that's the last surviving music of my personal favorites from the 1970s still in my possession and playable: most of it being on cassette tapes, it disintegrated decades ago). But fortunately the local Tennessee radio station offered a better than usual selection for me, and I also managed to find a Los Angeles radio channel on Roku that somehow worked through the Belkin router-- so long as I didn't dare to pause the music play once it began.

I've learned through lots of online shopping experiences the last few years that Amazon.com is usually the first place to check for these things, because they'll often have the biggest selection and lowest prices, plus a superb customer rating and review system to help guide your decisions (if you can afford the considerable time required to study it). So, off to Amazon I went!

I hated being caught with a dead router like this, and almost being forced to buy an expensive bad router at Walmart. I also hated being stuck with an old spare router that was slow, and only worked at all for about 60% of the web sites we needed or wanted. At the same time I was wary of buying any router tech which was too old, and might have problems with newer network using gear. So I checked the first availability dates on Amazon of the routers I looked at, as well as the general specs, prices, and reviews.

I prefer buying items from Amazon which have the maximum number of reviews (like in the thousands), and an average review rating of four or more stars out of five.

However, I also try to keep in mind that (especially with tech items), a greater quantity of reviews also comes naturally to products which are long in the tooth, and maybe nearing the end of their useful market life. And Amazon's helpful feature of letting you see the latest reviews first if you want, helps you examine this possibility, as well as the chance that recent customers have experienced a rash of defective items, which hasn't yet had much impact on the average reviews score).

Where possible, I also like to see a second, independent source of reviews for an item. In tech goods, Newegg.com can serve for this at times.

In the end, I went with a TP-LINK TL-WR940N Wireless N300 Home Router, 300Mpbs, 3 External Antennas, IP QoS, WPS Button from 2010, and a Medialink Easy Setup Wireless Router, Repeater & Range Extender (300 Mbps) from 2010.

Yes: I bought two routers, rather than merely one. I'll explain why in a moment.

The now dead TRENDnet TW100-S4W1CA (Version G1.0R) 4-Port Broadband Router we'd previously been riding on was from 2004.

Yes, getting a router first manufactured later than 2010 would have likely offered up better performance in some things, as well as a longer life span compatibility-wise with future devices. But it would also have cost considerably more, and there'd be a thinner body of customer reviews to judge it by. And pretty much all net gear is disposable anyway these days, since the standards are changing so fast. So only rich folks or critical business operations can really justify spending the big bucks on the latest and greatest-- and taking the risks on items not yet vetted by at minimum hundreds of customers before them.

It looked like most any router we might have bought in desperation from Walmart would have cost at least $50, and likely considerably more. And been much less likely to satisfy us than a highly reviewed item bought online.

Amazon offers free shipping for orders of at least $35, which can take around a week to a week and a half to arrive. My first router choice was the TP-LINK TL-WR940N, which cost around $25.00 at the time. I was the one among my house mates most inconvenienced by our low powered router replacement, so I could determine how long we waited. I decided to go the free shipping route rather than pay for anything expedited, as I'd rather pay only for hardware and not for the gasoline used to transport it.

But that meant I needed to spend $10 more to get the free shipping. Well, it also struck me that I'd like to avoid being in such a pinch again any time soon, and one way to do that would be to buy a spare router too, at the same time. And the Medialink at around $15.00 was available.

The TP-Link was my first choice for a replacement router, with over 600 Amazon customer reviews, averaging four stars out of five. This same router also had a considerable number of high rated reviews on Newegg.

The Medialink was my second choice for a replacement, but actually had almost 6000 Amazon reviews averaging four out of five stars. Unfortunately, I could find no other significant quantity of reviews for Medialink online, as it seems it's been sold almost exclusively at Amazon since its release, or else no others online have carried it for a while now.

Getting the Medialink in addition to the TP-Link put me about $5.00 over the number required for free shipping.

Getting two different brands and models of router gave me better odds of getting at least one working router upon arrival, thereby reducing the chance I'd be stuck for another week or two with the barely running Belkin. Two different routers also meant if both worked, I'd surely have a better spare than the Belkin too, for future problems. It also meant I could try both, and use whichever one I liked best as the indefinite replacement.

And lastly, there might even be a way to use both the routers simultaneously, if it seems desirable (I was still checking into that one at the time I typed this).

Both routers arrived a day sooner than Amazon had told me to expect them (hooray!).

Up to now we've been using a wired router in the basement, with an old light duty Apple Express (first generation) wireless router or switch near the center of the first floor ceiling.

We've always had problems with the Apple Express, such as being unable to secure it with passwords, as that seemed to force me to reset the main wired router all the time to let new users get online wirelessly. Plus, it only supported 10 devices at once, and managing it via our aged iMac didn't seem to work well at all. So I'd like to be rid of it. The two new routers both possess wired ports and wireless antennas. So I figure just one of them could replace both the Apple Express and the old dead wired router in their duties.

Unfortunately, the optimum position for a wifi router is near the first floor ceiling of the center of your home, and to replace our wired router, the new one must go into the basement, putting it at roughly first floor floor level, or under the first step of our stairs leading to the second floor. So the signal must pass through considerable hardwood and plaster, before ever even reaching a human being standing within two feet of it. And more realistically, the signal will pass that first barrier, then have to pass at least one or two more walls to reach persons in typical every day locations in the house.

The TP-Link has large exposed antennas, which I assume will work better than the smaller hidden ones in the Medialink for getting through walls. So I'm trying the TP-Link under the stairs first.

If the TP-Link wireless signal doesn't reach far enough there, I can always supplement it with the old Apple Express, in its original location parked near the ceiling of center of the first floor. Or, more preferably, perhaps replace the Apple Express there with the new Medialink, if that router will function in that manner (I still need to check into that)....

… and so I did (I'm writing this part the next day). Turns out that the process of slaving the Medialink to the TP-Link would be sort of arduous and time-consuming (as well as perhaps not optimal signal strength and speed-wise); so I'm hoping to avoid that. Especially as it would take the household offline for a while again while I fiddled with it. And we're still getting over the degraded internet we had to deal with for a solid week before this.

However, I did manage to do some non-scientific testing of the TP-Link's signal, with a wifi strength meter app on my Amazon Fire tablet. You could tell there that the basement location is really dampening down the signal a lot. But the real test is surfing, right? Right. So I asked our primary resident wifi surfer how it was doing, and they said great. Of course, they mostly stay in the one spot in the house, so I borrowed their Android tablet to watch Youtube videos while moving from one far corner of the structure to another. And the video seemed to play well. In fact, the signal seems to be 'good enough'. But still, the signal wasn't as strong as I would have preferred. Especially for those times when lots of wireless equipped relatives are visiting. And we here may soon try cutting our phone bills to almost nothing via some new and innovative carriers which depend heavily upon wifi to work. So we need as good a wifi network as we can get.

So I spent more time looking into my options for boosting the signal. I also wanted a way to fully test the Medialink too, within the time frame required for getting a refund or replacement from Amazon if it was a dud. And using both new routers for net in the house indefinitely, rather than simply keeping one in storage for a spare, seemed to make better sense too, since gear like this will go obsolete in just a few years. I mean, I wanted to have my back up router and make use of it in normal times, too.

Until I had a good way to add it to the system, I merely plugged it in to power (but no LAN access) overnight, to let it 'burn in' (if they fail any time soon after purchase, electronics often fail in the first 24 hours of use; so burn in is advisable so as to find out sooner rather than later).

The Medialink's instructions/manual primarily offered up only two ways to use the device: as either the primary router (which I was already using the TP-Link for), or as an 'access point'-- a wireless supplement to the existing wifi network the TP-Link already provided. There was also perhaps a way to use it as a repeater, explained on the internet.

There were trade offs involved in all these options. I didn't need a repeater, as although the house is big, it's not that big. I didn't see much if anything to gain by switching places between the Medialink and the TP-Link. And I sure didn't like the extra difficulties involved in setting up the Medialink as an 'access point'.

I believe I ran across some interesting and free open source software for routers that lots of people like to use to expand their options with routers like these, too. But my router plans weren't sufficiently ambitious to require extra exertions like that-- I hoped.

No, what I wanted to do was wire connect the Medialink to a network switch, which was wire connected to the TP-Link in the basement, and have the Medialink become the house wifi hub, much as the old Apple Express had been connected to the system, and used.

One thing which greatly facilitated this was the fact that the TP-Link has a button on its front panel which toggles on or off its own wifi broadcasting: so I was able to shut down the wireless part of the TP-Link router easy-as-pie, without bothering the wired performance (I did find that I had to hold the button down for a second or two to get the toggle to work; that's apparently built-in to prevent people from unknowingly switching off their wifi with accidental brushes of their fingers against the button).

Alas, the Medialink didn't just plug and play in that role like the Apple Express had. It required more initial set up before it'd create a wifi network at all (if my memory of the Apple Express set up maybe 15 years ago is accurate). And I couldn't access it as easily for that from my PC, wire connected to a network switch, which was itself wire connected to another network switch (the latter one being the one that also connected to the Medialink and the TP-Link routers).

No: I had to move the Medialink to my desktop PC, and connect my PC via Ethernet directly to the Medialink, and the Medialink to my network switch there (which wire connected to the other network switch, which itself wire connected to the TP-Link). Once I did that, I was able to access the Medialink's set up software via the IP address provided in its user manual, with my PC web browser. There, I configured the Medialink's wifi network with essentially the same security and broadcast settings I'd previously done for the TP-Link.

Then came the real test: I unpowered the Medialink, disconnected it from everything near my desktop PC, then put it back where I wanted it, wire connected to the upstairs network switch, which was itself wire connected to the TP-Link. Then I powered it up, and held my breath.

Hooray! It worked! Everything worked! I did some testing here and there of both my wired and wireless networks, and everything seemed fine.

And just the next day, only maybe 14 hours or so after I'd achieved this, a bunch of my nephews showed up wanting to watch Netflix on the living room set top box which had previously been wire connected to the basement router which died, and I had left disconnected during all this reconfiguration of new equipment. Now, I faced maybe 20 minutes of trying to locate the proper cable to wire connect it to the TP-Link-- until I remembered I'd set up the wireless router just the previous night. So I used the set top box to log in to the Medialink wifi, and voila! It was online!

As I write this, the boys are watching “I, Frankenstein” on Netflix, with apparently no problems at all, in the biggest test yet of the new set up.

And there you have some of the technology highlights and low points of the past month and a half for me personally.

4-26-15 UPDATE: We've been riding on the TP-Link more than two weeks as I write this, and on the Medialink too only three days less than that, and both routers are working great.

I've also gone into the TP-Link configuration screen again and changed the admin username and password from their defaults to my own choices, for greater security, since pretty much anyone could come through my ISP connection to try to mess with the TP-Link 24-7, otherwise. END UPDATE.

BACK to Dead USB ports and/or flash drives; signing up for cloud storage; incorrect time/date-keeping on my Windows PC; and severe eye strain...