When connected to my GT-AX6000 something is not allowing certain apps or functions to work on our phones and I need help how to troubleshoot

[drinkingbird]

Verizon internet is not yet available to me, but I would switch if it works well and is available, I have no love for AT&T. They do have an option I can buy a static IP and setup some kind of cascaded router setup, but it's 300 dollars the first year and like 200 per year after that.

As far as IPv6 settings, I didn't have it on with the netgear. I only tried that as part of troubleshooting and left it on. It was having these issues without it on, or with it on. With the older netgear, I didn't really do anything on it, and with ATT it was only the setting for the dmzplus mode and I didn't change anything else, because it did work. The ATT router has very poor range, the netgear router at the time was to see if I could get better signal and I was able to. At that time only had one xbox so it wasn't really a problem. But like I said that router took a dump on me, it was about 8 years old.

As far as public IP address, it maybe isn't really public, it starts with 172. I'm trying to figure out where to see it with the ISP router, it's also a 172 but something else for the second number. I was googling how to see it, but it said if its 172 or 192 its probably not the public ip. I dont know. The asus router is 192.168.x.x locally on that network.

In any case, this weekend I'm going to just go ahead and factory reset everything, that should turn off ipv6, I think its off by default. I might pick up a used netgear router like the kind I had before off ebay, I saw them pretty cheap, maybe just switch back to that.

172.16.x.x through 172.31.x.x are private IPs. Merlin uPNP won't work with that, and if your ISP's WAN is 172.x.x also, you're basically stuck as even in DMZ, they are doing a NAT somewhere up the line. You don't have to worry about masking your IPs here since nobody could ever hack or reach those 172.x IPs. Unless their IP falls outside of the range 172.16.x.x through 172.31.x.x. The rest of that network is public.

In this case, getting IPv6 up and running may be your only option to avoid double (possibly even triple) NAT. Generally, for outbound connections, multiple layers of NAT is not an issue, so perhaps your only problem is that uPNP isn't functioning. If the ISP router doesn't let you set your own LAN subnet (sounds like it doesn't if it is extending the WAN subnet to the DMZ device) then running stock AsusWRT instead of merlin may solve your problems. If you look in your log on the Asus you'll probably see miniUPNPd messages saying you have a private IP and disabling itself.

But even if you got uPNP functioning on the Asus, and have DMZ enabled on the ISP router, if the ISP router WAN IP is 172.16 through 172.31 also, they are still doing a NAT somewhere upstream so uPNP won't work anyway. Or maybe the 172 you're seeing is just a management IP and their WAN IP is in fact public.

I'm wondering if maybe with the Netgear you had IPv6 up and running and just didn't realize it....

 

[dyer4789]

172.16.x.x through 172.31.x.x are private IPs. Merlin uPNP won't work with that, and if your ISP's WAN is 172.x.x also, you're basically stuck as even in DMZ, they are doing a NAT somewhere up the line. You don't have to worry about masking your IPs here since nobody could ever hack or reach those 172.x IPs. Unless their IP falls outside of the range 172.16.x.x through 172.31.x.x. The rest of that network is public.

In this case, getting IPv6 up and running may be your only option to avoid double (possibly even triple) NAT. Generally, for outbound connections, multiple layers of NAT is not an issue, so perhaps your only problem is that uPNP isn't functioning. If the ISP router doesn't let you set your own LAN subnet (sounds like it doesn't if it is extending the WAN subnet to the DMZ device) then running stock AsusWRT instead of merlin may solve your problems. If you look in your log on the Asus you'll probably see miniUPNPd messages saying you have a private IP and disabling itself.

But even if you got uPNP functioning on the Asus, and have DMZ enabled on the ISP router, if the ISP router WAN IP is 172.16 through 172.31 also, they are still doing a NAT somewhere upstream so uPNP won't work anyway. Or maybe the 172 you're seeing is just a management IP and their WAN IP is in fact public.

I'm wondering if maybe with the Netgear you had IPv6 up and running and just didn't realize it....

I didn't have IPv6 before and the only reason I am confident on that is because I had to turn it on in the isp gateway, it is not on by default and I had to look up what settings to use on the Asus router. Maybe uPNP isn't working but I do know we can play all the video games but can't if they are on att. But the video games did work on Asus both before and after I turned on ipv6 to try to see if that helped my other problems. But I can turn it back off just as easy

 

[sfx2000]

This might help... it does work, but you need to do it their way...

Configuring IP Passthrough and DMZplus

When configured for IP Passthrough (Passthrough Mode) the AT&T provided gateway shares its Dynamic WAN IP address with a single device on the LAN.

www.att.com

With ATT Fiber, you're stuck with the RG, so DMZplus is the option and path to take... go outside of their setup, you're on your own, and they will not support you.

 

[dyer4789]

This might help... it does work, but you need to do it their way...

Configuring IP Passthrough and DMZplus

When configured for IP Passthrough (Passthrough Mode) the AT&T provided gateway shares its Dynamic WAN IP address with a single device on the LAN.

www.att.com

With ATT Fiber, you're stuck with the RG, so DMZplus is the option and path to take... go outside of their setup, you're on your own, and they will not support you.

Yeah, I have a pace gateway, and it's setup how they suggest, I am going to try to factory reset though this weekend

 

[dyer4789]

Well, as I have 3 small kids, I have only so much time. Today when my kids went outside and I told my wife I needed an hour or so, so she took the baby out I finally did reset the gateway. So first, I took Merlin off the ASUS router. Then, I reset the ASUS router and unplugged it from the gateway. I then reset the ISP gateway. Then when it came back up, I disabled the wi-fi networks on it. Then I connected the ASUS router. Once the device saw the Asus router, I set the router to the DMZplus. The ASUS router is setup in router mode. The ISP gateway still assigns it a "public address" of 172.5.x.x. It does claim it's public, and everything I read, that's the best you can get they claim it's public somehow behind the scenes in all of the forums and such that I saw over at ATT. I should have saved the forum link to that but I didn't and I've ran out of time the kids need dinner.

But, the apps that weren't working before seem to be working now. I have to now go and reconnect a handful of smart devices that seemed to lose connection in this, but maybe I'll find once I add something it stops working, or better case is everything just works. We will see. Thanks for the help

 

[drinkingbird]

Well, as I have 3 small kids, I have only so much time. Today when my kids went outside and I told my wife I needed an hour or so, so she took the baby out I finally did reset the gateway. So first, I took Merlin off the ASUS router. Then, I reset the ASUS router and unplugged it from the gateway. I then reset the ISP gateway. Then when it came back up, I disabled the wi-fi networks on it. Then I connected the ASUS router. Once the device saw the Asus router, I set the router to the DMZplus. The ASUS router is setup in router mode. The ISP gateway still assigns it a "public address" of 172.5.x.x. It does claim it's public, and everything I read, that's the best you can get they claim it's public somehow behind the scenes in all of the forums and such that I saw over at ATT. I should have saved the forum link to that but I didn't and I've ran out of time the kids need dinner.

But, the apps that weren't working before seem to be working now. I have to now go and reconnect a handful of smart devices that seemed to lose connection in this, but maybe I'll find once I add something it stops working, or better case is everything just works. We will see. Thanks for the help

172.5 is public, so you should be all set with uPNP etc, even on Merlin.

 

[dyer4789]

172.5 is public, so you should be all set with uPNP etc, even on Merlin.

 

[dyer4789]

Ahh, I guess I misunderstood earlier, it was 172.5 before all this, I guess thats what I get for not showing it all

But, it does still seem to be working, and I never did a factory reset of the ISP gateway before. But, in any case good to know I can put merlin back on, although I only really put it on before just for troubleshooting hoping that would fix this. I probably won't touch anything again unless something stops working. Thanks again

 

[drinkingbird]

Ahh, I guess I misunderstood earlier, it was 172.5 before all this, I guess thats what I get for not showing it all

But, it does still seem to be working, and I never did a factory reset of the ISP gateway before. But, in any case good to know I can put merlin back on, although I only really put it on before just for troubleshooting hoping that would fix this. I probably won't touch anything again unless something stops working. Thanks again

Yeah if you don't specifically need the Merlin features then, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

To ensure your ISP isn't doing anything special, go to www.whatsmyip.net and see if it shows the same 172.5 that you see on the WAN (not sure if you're seeing that on the WAN of your ISP router, your Asus router, or both)? Sounds like the DMZPlus somehow is replicating the ISP WAN IP to your Asus WAN also. Bit odd but doable.

FYI with 172 they made it a bit confusing when they laid it out decades ago
172.0.0.0 through 172.15.255.255 is public
172.16.0.0 through 172.31.255.255 is private
172.32.0.0 through 172.255.255.255 is public

Other private ranges are
10.0.0.0 through 10.255.255.255
192.168.0.0 through 192.168.255.255

Then there is CGNAT 100.64.0.0 through 100.127.255.255 which is "semi-private" but sounds like they're not using that with you so you don't have to worry about it.

 

[sfx2000]

Yeah, I have a pace gateway, and it's setup how they suggest, I am going to try to factory reset though this weekend

sounds like you have things sorted...

Would be nice if ATT allowed full-on bridge mode, but DMZPlus is a best case compromise...

 

[dyer4789]

Well everybody for future reference if somebody finds this thread , it's been a few weeks, looks like it's all been resolved, I think the factory reset of the AT&T gateway did the trick in this case. Thanks again. The problems definetly would have presented itself by now so I think it's good to go.