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X10 & Netgear DG834v5 Wifi Connection Problems - Solution

Hello all,
I love my X10, but the frustration with getting it to connect to my Netgear DG834 router was getting to me, so I dedicated an afternoon to working out a solution and I've found one that works for me, so I hope it'll work for you too.
Summary of problem
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The phone will connect to the Router once, and once only. Any attempt to re-connect to the wifi will result in the phone disconnecting, scanning again, then discinnecting until the user gives up. Nothing will cause the phone to reconnect (telling it to forget the connection for example). The only surefire way to reconnect is to reboot the router each time - not ideal.
Manually adding a Static IP also doesn't work - which is weird as that is how I've solved it, see below.
Scale of problem
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The problem seems to be with the router and not necessarily the phone as it appears to be on a wide range of phones (Hero, Droid, Touch HD etc.). Seeing at the DG834 is the most popular router in the world, and Android is growing all the time, there are a large number of people affected.
However Iphone and Symbian phones appear to be unaffected.
Reason for the problem
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Currently unknown, but appears to be something to do with the handshaking procedure when a device asks the router for an address (DHCP) - though as to what I don't know.
Solution
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1) Download an app called WiFiStatic from the App Market. WiFiStatic takes each DHCP assigned IP address and stores it in a small database to be re-applied whenever you are back in range of the same Router again. It is not an ideal solution as you may have to re-scan and re-assign if you visit a busy hotspot, but this is a two press function, so it's not that onerous.
2) Turn off your Router. Make sure the WiFi on your phone is off too.
3) With the router off, clear your Remembered WiFi connections (or at the very least the Netgear connection). Once that's done, turn the Router on again and wait until it is full back up again.
4) When the Router is fully operational again, turn on your wifi on the phone and let is scan for and connect to the Netgear Router. You may need to tell it to connect from the Wireless Settings menu on the phone.
5) The phone should now connect to the Router successfully. If it doesn't, repeat the above procedure.
6) With the phone connected to the router, fire up WiFiStatic. Check Auto Switch and Show Visual Prompt if they are not already selected, then Tap Add configuration at the bottom of the screen.
7) The IP address and other settings assigned by your router should be displayed at the top of the screen, at the bottom should be the name of your router and its MAC address. If not then tap Menu > Generate to populate the form.
8)Tap Menu > Done when everything is ok.
That's it. Now when you move into range of your Netgear, you should get connected, though it does take a bit longer than normal (the Router still wants to assign an address first before accepting the static IP). You can speed this up by changing the Device table on the router to always keep the Phone's static IP open.
This shouldn't work as all my other attempts with Static IP failed, but I've had five days now of instant connection to WiFi at home, so something has been freed up.

i can not tell you how seeing this post was like finding bin ladin in the white house. Prob would have found him twice trying to solve this WIFI problem. And the strange thing is this is the 1st phone i have had that there are so few posts about it...is everyone on that icrack? scary. cheers to you...

Thank you for posting this.
I tried this with my and it seems it doesn't make a difference for me. I still can only connect once to the router and for me to connect again i have to restart the router again. Am i missing something?
Problem is when I connect for the first time at home it works then when i leave to the office i use the wifi there and never have any problems there but when i get back home it doesn't work. Do you guys switch the wifi off manually when you are not using it?

one thing that is almost always overlooked is updating the router's firmware. this usually solves a number of issues. I dont know about netgear but it's worth a try to update

bimmerboii said:
one thing that is almost always overlooked is updating the router's firmware. this usually solves a number of issues. I dont know about netgear but it's worth a try to update
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That was one of the first thing i tried....it seems i have the latest firmware.

Is this an issue for a lot of people then? Ive one of these routers and never had an issue connecting any phones to it. Had 3 nokias and 3 different android phones, currently on the x10, and they all connected fine everytime.

i have some troubles in x10i wifi connection and holp someone helps me~
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im chinese, my x10i have had the lastest firmware but the phone cant connect the AP which set the channel is "13". but i used it long before and suddy just one day i find it dosnt work~ it cant scan(and find) the AP anymore !
then i have tried and config the router in another wifi channel(just like 1,8,11..) and the phone can scan and refind the AP.
i have tried to reload the phone's default setting,but it dont work(in channel 13)ToT
---------------------------
someone tell me why? and someone give me some suggest?
in china , lots of router's wifi channel are using "13" by default(factory setting);so, if my x10i cant works in that channel means i couldnt find the "opend APs" which in the public place(like KFC~~)
THX to help~

StampedChipmunk said:
Hello all,
I love my X10, but the frustration with getting it to connect to my Netgear DG834 router was getting to me, so I dedicated an afternoon to working out a solution and I've found one that works for me, so I hope it'll work for you too.
<snip>.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you! I have spent three days trying to get my phone to re-connect to a DG834v5.
Your solution has worked! I had gone as far as reserving an IP address on the router and linked it to the MAC of the phone... no dice. The phone would connect once and then never again until the router was reset. Really irritating because I have two PPPoe connections running through the router with a routing table that has to be re-loaded via telnet every time the router is reset. I was considering a new phone or a new router.

HI,
I have near the same problem.
But I found out that when I remove on the access point the hidden function ( SID ) then it works perfect.
so that is a bug in the ROM of the X10, I have the R2b026.
At the moment everone can see my Access Point but I can live with that solution.

Worked for me! Many many thanks this had been infuriating me...

Same problem here - never had an issue with any other router, so I blame Netgear...
Let's just hope this works - it's been driving me crazy for the past 5 days...

Neh, hasn't worked for me....
Stupid freakin' Netgear...

works on the HD2 aswell. Thanks alot!

Not just Netgear, maybe Android
k1sr said:
Same problem here - never had an issue with any other router, so I blame Netgear...
Let's just hope this works - it's been driving me crazy for the past 5 days...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am having the same issue on my HD2 Android 2.3.4, connecting to a D-Link DIR-635. If I use Static IP, everything is fine...

WORKS! I can't believe it, finally i can disconnect and connect without having to reset my router everytime. BIG thanks man!

alright, it worked fine for the first 5-6 hours. then it went back to not connecting without rebooting the router. this problem happens only with my home router, at work i can connect fine, as well as in other places.
any thoughts or solutions? i mean it did work in the beginning, then why did it stop? shall i change my router?
P.S.: i noticed that every time i connect to my home router i get the same IP address and all the stats are the same.

[Q] Obtaining IP Address.

Alright, I'm kinda having a pretty annoying issue now.
My Wildfire is flashed with OpenFire.
Since I don't have a wireless router I use connectify.
I setup my connectify network, and I try to connect to it, but my Wildfire just shows ''Obtaining IP-Address'', then it disappears, and then it says ''Obtaining IP-Address'', and this is kinda an endless loop.
Anyone have any advice on how to fix this?

I have kind of same situation where it only says Obtaining adress and nothing happens. It used to happen to me only on one specific router and when that router was reseted it was all OK. But now it happens again but resetting doesn't help. Any help?

I just plugged out the power source of my router for an entire day, and now I can connect to it and everything is working fine.

If resets of anything aren't working for you i'd suggest flashing the stock modem. This has been the case for a couple users. I'm currently stuck in the same place as you and I reflashed my own stock modem (sgs2) if anyone has any tips for me I would be VERY grateful!

[Q] Reboot router to connect to Wifi

I'm puzzled by the behavior of my phone. For probably a week at a time, I go to work, connect to a WIFI there, then come home, connect to a WIFI there. No problems at all.
Then it seems like after a week or so of 'being good' sometimes I'll wake up the phone and it will see the network, but will not connect to it, asks for passphrase repeatedly (WPA2-AES Cisco E3000 router) but just will not connect. I have found no way to trigger the phone to reconnect (and I refuse to do another hard reset because that is no solution at all).
The simple fix is to reboot the router. Presto, the phone will connect almost immediately.
I am willing to accept that maybe something is wrong with my router, although I have 3 laptops and a couple of IP cameras, and an Xbox that connect wirelessly all the time, and I never ever see this refusal to connect on any of those devices, and my wife's Blackberry will also connect whenever. So I'm thinking its my phone.
So for the experts out there, what is it about rebooting the router that fixes the problem?
I only recently learned how to get into the manufacturer's special app, so I'm going to pay attention to my IP address next time I have an issue, and see if it actually changes when I reboot after this problem occurs again.
Where does one discover how and what can be tweaked in the secret app? I'm cautious but not afraid....hey, I've edited the windows registry countless times on my PC and never toasted the OS yet! Does that count for something?
Add: I had this happen once at my work WIFI, using an ancient DLink router using WEP. At the time, I was trying out a bluetooth headset (Plantronics Backbeat), which worked, albeit, after I was done listening to the podcast, be darned if I didn't get into this refusal to connect thing, and unbeknownst to me, I was using the 3G data connection for what I thought was a wifi broadcast. That sucked 175 megs that day! I was a bit pissed about that. I have not used the Bluetooth since then.
Rebooting my router at work fixed the problem but I hate doing that, because I've got other equipment on that network that likes to be permanently connected.

the same happened to a frined of mine: interoperability issues with that model of router and the phone, changed the router and after everything worked perfectly, that sucks, but it is

Had a similar problem, and simply could not pinpoint the cause. Solution? I resetted my router to factory settings, and started to change all the settings from scratch to my desired settings. One thing that helped solve my problem was that I changed the default IP address used by the router (in my case, 192.168.0.1) as well as the IP range to something more ... random. Also, I limited the number of allowed IPs to 10 rather than the default 100...That helped. Never got a disconnect or problem connecting again. I had the same thing happen on my mother's iPhone and my brother's Galaxy S, and this solved it.

Help with fixing Wi-Fi

I have reached my wit's end trying to resolve my problems, so I'm posting here for ideas on fixing this, any input is appreciated!
When this started I was on stock, rooted, ICS 4.0.3 and had been for months. My wife has a nexus s with the same config and hers works fine.
Last week, my daughters sidekick 4G stopped having wi-fi internet connectivity. I turned her wi-fi off, then back on and it was fine and has been ever since. Later that night, my nexus did the same thing, the same procedure resolved it. Ever since then, my wi-fi will only work for 1-5 minutes after turning the wi-fi on. This is the only thing I can think of that changed that could have caused this. This was the first night we connected her sidekick to wi-fi.
The wifi symbol is up there, it'll be blue for up to half an hour, but won't have internet connectivity for long. One thing I noticed pretty quickly was that even though the grey wi-fi symbol is there, I can't access the router settings at 192.168.1.1 from the phone. I thought the grey wifi symbol still indicated I was connected to the router still, but it's not working. Each time this happens, I can turn wi-fi off, back on immediately and it'll work for 1-5 minutes. It appears that the more I constantly use it after turning it back on, it seems to maintain connectivity longer.
Last weekend, just after these issues started, I visited my sister and my phone operated on her wi-fi all weekend just fine.
When I came back home, my problems started immediately.
Here's what I've tried in pretty much the order I tried them:
I started by uninstalling avast, facebook, and autostarts
selected "Forget network" in access points screen and reconnected
Factory reset
Wipe dalvik cache & fix permissions
see if it worked without sim card in (it didn't)
flash GB broadcom driver
Switched router channel from 6 to 1
flash stock 2.3.6 (wi-fi problems still present)
flash OTA ICS (still had problems)
flash stock 2.3.6
flash OTA ICS
re-root
Flash PixelROM 1.60 LiteTouch
factory reset router (No wifi problems on using open network and default SSID for 30 minutes!)
resetup WPA Personal security and rename SSID same as before
Worked for another 15 minutes or so after this
flashed stock 2.3.6
flashed OTA ICS
re-rooted
Restored nandroid backup - quit working after this step
Factory reset router - worked for about 15 minutes, I decided I was ok so I setup security and SSID as before, then it quit working again
flashed PixelRom 1.60 LiteTouch
flashed stock 2.3.6
Flashed OTA ICS - THIS time I did not restore my google backups from the cloud, fearing that this was somehow restoring something that was causing me problems. It did not help.
Changed SSID on my router and reconnected phone
I have spent countless hours trying to fix this. I don't believe it's the hardware because the router factory reset seems to help quite a bit, works fine on unencrypted default router settings, and it worked on my sister's wi-fi.
I have nmap and wireshark and have a basic working knowledge of them. I have adb setup and usable on my computer. I also have dd-wrt installed on my router and have for years. Is there any kind of IP or hardware logging I could perform with these tools to help figure out what's going on??? ANY help is GREATLY appreciated!!

Well i'm no expert with any of this, but it sounds more like a router issue.. If both your sidekick and nexus have the same characteristics of failing wifi, it cant be the devices..
If you've already reset your router and it does the same exact thing, maybe it is something wrong with the router itself. You said it connected fine at your sisters house, so it cant be any hardware within the phone.. The only thing I could think of is maybe try a different router in your house to see if it works? If that helps get rid of the connectivity issue, then you can just get a new router and be happy with the wifis

I don't think a *hardware* problem with the router would only affect 1 device connecting to it wirelessly. I would think that kind of issue would affect all devices on the network.
Which makes me wonder if there's a setting on the router that may be causing it somehow, or some combination of packets might somehow cause the router to block my phone.
But again, I'm open to ideas here and I appreciate your input. I think getting another router will be my next step if I don't hear anything better by the time I get my next paycheck.

nevarDeath said:
I don't think a *hardware* problem with the router would only affect 1 device connecting to it wirelessly. I would think that kind of issue would affect all devices on the network.
Which makes me wonder if there's a setting on the router that may be causing it somehow, or some combination of packets might somehow cause the router to block my phone.
But again, I'm open to ideas here and I appreciate your input. I think getting another router will be my next step if I don't hear anything better by the time I get my next paycheck.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ohh, I thought you had said that both the sidekick and nexus were having problems connecting. My bad.
But yeah have you changed any settings on it lately? Or messed with anything related to the router? Some setting may be kicking your device off after 5 mins, maybe some frequency setting or something dumb like that, I have no clue.
I know how it feels to have funky wifi, so I was only trying to help. good luck

Have you removed DD-WRT from your Wireless Router and back to stock OS? I had a Linksys router with DD-WRT and after about 3 years it started working so weird it became useless with any device. Had to buy a new one.
BTW, are other devices connecting fine to this router?
As swamp goblin stated, I would try with a new router.

It sounds like an issue on your router (or AP) with mixed client settings. I have had this issue with an old Netgear AP.
Try forcing "WPA2 with AES only" if all clients support it, otherwise force "WPA with TKIP only". If you have mixed B/G/N devices, force the fastest mode that all devices support. I use "G only".
Then remove and re-add the router on all your devices.
Also check for router firmware updates, and if you use DD-WRT firmware, find the Wiki page for your model and revision and use the suggested build there. The DD-WRT database they have is a mess and should not be used!

swamp goblin said:
Ohh, I thought you had said that both the sidekick and nexus were having problems connecting. My bad.
But yeah have you changed any settings on it lately? Or messed with anything related to the router? Some setting may be kicking your device off after 5 mins, maybe some frequency setting or something dumb like that, I have no clue.
I know how it feels to have funky wifi, so I was only trying to help. good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I haven't changed any settings, until this problem began, which makes this even more maddening. I appreciate your input regardless
Oogway13 said:
Have you removed DD-WRT from your Wireless Router and back to stock OS? I had a Linksys router with DD-WRT and after about 3 years it started working so weird it became useless with any device. Had to buy a new one.
BTW, are other devices connecting fine to this router?
As swamp goblin stated, I would try with a new router.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I haven't removed it. I thought I had a model that couldn't go back to stock, but I WILL be looking into this. The other devices connecting fine are Sidekick 4G, Wife's Nexus S, Acer Aspire one, HP tx2000 laptop, and my wife's HP laptop. I also have my satellite receiver connected via ethernet.
SpookyTunes said:
It sounds like an issue on your router (or AP) with mixed client settings. I have had this issue with an old Netgear AP.
Try forcing "WPA2 with AES only" if all clients support it, otherwise force "WPA with TKIP only". If you have mixed B/G/N devices, force the fastest mode that all devices support. I use "G only".
Then remove and re-add the router on all your devices.
Also check for router firmware updates, and if you use DD-WRT firmware, find the Wiki page for your model and revision and use the suggested build there. The DD-WRT database they have is a mess and should not be used!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I will certainly try these settings. Thanks for the tip on the wiki page

I had this problem too, I solved only flash again my radio...
Try if solve...
Or if don't work try to make a reset.
Sent from my Nexus S using Tapatalk 2 Beta-4

SpookyTunes said:
...Try forcing "WPA2 with AES only" if all clients support i...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
THIS FIXED IT! I tried it first since it was the simplest solution and I've been 4 days with no loss of connectivity since I changed it to AES only, which all my clients do support! Thanks so much!

WiFi disconnecting issue

Well this is weird, my new note is now disconnecting from my WiFi router after a short period of inactivity. This just started a couple days ago (just before this new 2nd firmware update). I'm not sure how long it takes to happen, but it's somewhere close to an hour. When I find my tablet disconnected, the notifications tell me that there are networks available in one notification and that my crudentials timed out in another. It will not automatically reconnect to my router either, so I have to go and reconnect to it manually each time...and it's a pain in the yang.
The odd thing is, it remembers the WiFi password, so it's not like it completely dumped the settings. So in theory, it should reconnect automatically since it still remembers the network and password.
It could just be my router, but my SIII and my laptop have never had this issue. I checked the settings to see if I was in power save mode or anything...but I'm not.
Any suggestions appreciated.

Well, I have tried restarting the tablet and the router...both to no avail.
This is getting frusterating now. I simply watched an epsiode of the Walking Dead and it killed my connection while doing that...WTF? It also did it later while my tablet was downloading a bunch of updates, so a few of those updates didn't download because the connection died after a while.
Why would it do this even when the tablet and the connection are active?

I am having the same issue, but it isn't my Note dropping the connection, it is my router rebooting.
Next time it happens, log into your router and check on the router uptime to see if it just reset.
What router do you have?
Mine is a D-Link DIR-655

Qzic said:
I am having the same issue, but it isn't my Note dropping the connection, it is my router rebooting.
Next time it happens, log into your router and check on the router uptime to see if it just reset.
What router do you have?
Mine is a D-Link DIR-655
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the same router, but it's not doing what yours is doing (my uptime has been for over a week it says). But that does make me wonder if it is still an issue with the router...
I have been searching and some of the other samsung devices that had issues and some of them (that didn't require root) were fixed by setting the DHCP release time to 2 days (instead of holding it forever) and/or setting the ip to a static one on their phones. I plan on trying this next and letting you all know how it goes.

Yay! So the fix was to set a static IP on my tablet...that's it. My router was already set to release DHCP every 24 hours, so I didn't change any settings there. Before I did this, my connection was dropping about every 15 minutes. After setting the static IP, I let it sit for an hour and it's still holding strong.

Did you set a static IP directly on the tablet, or did you set a reserved IP on the router?

Qzic said:
Did you set a static IP directly on the tablet, or did you set a reserved IP on the router?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I set the static IP directly on the tablet and I have not had an issue since doing this.

Maybe you can restore your tablet to solve this problem.

does it happen on other wireless networks? what security are you using? wep/wpa?
try changing the security to see if that helps. odd that a static ip fixes it. its almost like it loses its ip configuration.
when your tablet looses network, are you actively using it, or was it in sleep mode?

john10101 said:
does it happen on other wireless networks? what security are you using? wep/wpa?
try changing the security to see if that helps. odd that a static ip fixes it. its almost like it loses its ip configuration.
when your tablet looses network, are you actively using it, or was it in sleep mode?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The tablet would lose connection while actively using it...it was weird.
What's even weirder is that I have NOT set other WiFi connections to static IPs like I had to do with my D-Link router, yet the connections with those other routers have remained steady while in default DHCP modes. I have no idea why this would be the case (it doesn't make sense).
Like I said earlier, my router does not have very much in the way of special settings...just WPA 2, N-only mode, and a DHCP IP release after 24 hours of inactivity are the only options I enforced. Looking at my router logs, it definitely sees my tablet and updates the release time each time I use the tablet...but I don't see anything in the logs when the tablet suddenly disconnects from the router. So I have no idea if it's the router or the tablet. lol
I have not tried another security setting, but I don't want to lessen my security in this environment. Beseides, I know at least one othe router that I connect to is using WPA2 also.
I can live with this work-around as long as I don't have to force a static IP on every other router I connect to.

I have a different model dlink (dap2553) and I have the random disconnects also. I see wifi connected normally but no data flows. Eventually the connection drops and reestablishes fine for a while..before it all happens again.
Has the static ip solved this for everyone?
Tablet works fine on all other wifi aps and all other devices work fine on my ap

I also have a DLink router (DGL 4500), mind you, it's an utter piece of crap and I plan on replacing it with an Asus ac66u sooner or later. I also have this issue where it will show connected but no data will flow for a few seconds and then everything will be fine again. Static IP hasn't really solved much for me. I'm hoping that this indeed is a router issue so I can continue to use this in peace when I replace this DLink junk.

Static IP has not solved it for me. I have been using my travel router at home which does not reset.

change the channel on your router. the channel you're on may be saturated. i've got 3 routers with no problems:
1 belkin n300+ share - stock firmware
1 asus n56u - padavan firmware
1 asus ac66r - merlin
all steady.

Same problem. Just got it today and close to returning it. Factory reset and static IP didn't help.
Wasted 90 minutes trying different things. It's just bad hardware. I even installed Kies and let it re-image the whole thing to MK1 again (very very slowly). Just sitting at the intial setup where you pick the wifi you want to connect to i can watch it disconnect and reconnect over and over. Returning it in the morning.

skrowl said:
Same problem. Just got it today and close to returning it. Factory reset and static IP didn't help.
Wasted 90 minutes trying different things. It's just bad hardware. I even installed Kies and let it re-image the whole thing to MK1 again (very very slowly). Just sitting at the intial setup where you pick the wifi you want to connect to i can watch it disconnect and reconnect over and over. Returning it in the morning.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm also getting annoyed with the wifi problem

I'm having this problem too and it's really starting to annoy me. It didn't happen when I first bought it but now I have to re - enable wifi at least 10 times a day. Wifi will turn itself off when I'm using the tablet or when the screen is off, when it happens seems to be somewhat random but it won't happen again for at least 10 minutes after I've re-enabled wifi. I have tried everything but a factory reset...

You guys either have bad wifi/router or have defective devices. Minehas been perfect.

hmmmm.....
punkmilitia said:
You guys either have bad wifi/router or have defective devices. Minehas been perfect.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm on my 4th Note 10.1 2014. All of them had this issue with a bunch of different routers/configurations.

with four acting up it's quite possible that your routers and configurations are the problem. the note may just be picky mofo and you need to tweak you wifi set up. if you don't feel like fidgeting with your network, just give up and get something that plays well with you set up. when you've got limited free time network tweaking is not oneof the fun things on my list, lol.