A couple quick questions about changing providers

[iFrogMac]

Hey all,
As some know I moved from Florida to Louisiana and have a new apartment now. In that process I was also forced to change internet providers as Spectrum, who I had for years is not here. So, I had to go with Cox. Anyway, my questions are these:

1. After setting the cox gateway into Bridge mode per their support document instructions, everything connected normally with the RT-AX86U. With this said however, since Cox, and Spectrum are two different providers,do I need to change anything in WAN settings such as the mode like aggressive to normal, etc.
2. The other question is, is there a way to clear the router's history without doing a full factory reset. It seems like it remembers clients that were connected to it in my old place, though they show in the offline list. I found this out when doing manual DHCP assignments this morning.

Besides these two areas of questions, everything seems to be working. So, this was more of asking to avoid future problems if I didn't change something I should.

Thanks

The other question is, should I disable 11b, I don't have any devices, and the gateway from Cox only has g/n support for the 2.4 band enabled. So was wondering if I should tune the Asus to their defaults for better performance in this environment. It's far more congested then where I used to live. However, as mentioned my settings that came with me seem to work ok here as well. Just trying to tune for the new environment.

 

[Tech Junky]

You're over thinking things. Leave everything alone if it's working. The only thing that changed is your WAN IP.

 

[iFrogMac]

You're over thinking things. Leave everything alone if it's working. The only thing that changed is your WAN IP.

I just wanted to check as I was having issues with smart bulbs going offline. It happened even with the gateway they provided me. So that's why I put their gateway in modem only mode to use the Asus router. Now, as far as the bulbs, I found posts on reddit that suggested reserving the IP addresses for the lights solves this problem. So, I added dhcp reservations for the bulbs to see if that helps. That's also where I found out about the router's history of old clients. Thankfully I found a thread on here about that, and I was able to clear out that list without issues.

Another reason, I wanted to double check my settings is, I've noticed a bit more instability with cox at times than I ever had with spectrum, and wanted to make sure it wasn't something on my end that was set wrong. With that said thanks again, everything seems OK for the time being.

 

[Tech Junky]

noticed a bit more instability with cox

Different provider, different lines, etc.

There may be an issue they need to fix not your router. There could be an issue with the wiring in the apt or a loose fitting or splitter issue.

 

[OzarkEdge]

Hey all,
As some know I moved from Florida to Louisiana and have a new apartment now. In that process I was also forced to change internet providers as Spectrum, who I had for years is not here. So, I had to go with Cox. Anyway, my questions are these:

1. After setting the cox gateway into Bridge mode per their support document instructions, everything connected normally with the RT-AX86U. With this said however, since Cox, and Spectrum are two different providers,do I need to change anything in WAN settings such as the mode like aggressive to normal, etc.
2. The other question is, is there a way to clear the router's history without doing a full factory reset. It seems like it remembers clients that were connected to it in my old place, though they show in the offline list. I found this out when doing manual DHCP assignments this morning.

Besides these two areas of questions, everything seems to be working. So, this was more of asking to avoid future problems if I didn't change something I should.

Thanks

The other question is, should I disable 11b, I don't have any devices, and the gateway from Cox only has g/n support for the 2.4 band enabled. So was wondering if I should tune the Asus to their defaults for better performance in this environment. It's far more congested then where I used to live. However, as mentioned my settings that came with me seem to work ok here as well. Just trying to tune for the new environment.

1. I'd buy my own cable modem and not rent the COX gateway to save money and remove their gateway from your network equation.

Cox Certified Cable Modems

2. New ISP, new network... I'd commission it from scratch starting with a firmware hard reset.

OE

 

[sfx2000]

As some know I moved from Florida to Louisiana and have a new apartment now. In that process I was also forced to change internet providers as Spectrum, who I had for years is not here. So, I had to go with Cox. Anyway, my questions are these:

1. After setting the cox gateway into Bridge mode per their support document instructions, everything connected normally with the RT-AX86U. With this said however, since Cox, and Spectrum are two different providers,do I need to change anything in WAN settings such as the mode like aggressive to normal, etc.

Just note that Cox is pushing DOCSIS 3.1 in most of their markets, they do support 3.0, but it's deprecated, and they may not provision new accounts without have a 3.1 modem.

 

[iFrogMac]

Just note that Cox is pushing DOCSIS 3.1 in most of their markets, they do support 3.0, but it's deprecated, and they may not provision new accounts without have a 3.1 modem.

I'm certainly looking at modems. I am considering the Netgear CM2000, seems like it's a common one that works well, and has multi gig ports. As far as the router reset I don't think that will be necessary at this point. More likely the settings I changed and suggestions from threads dealing with specific issues I was experiencing might do it for now. Since it was mainly the bulbs having issues, could have been something specific to them. I'm holding off on the reset because the router was moved with a clean setup. Only some basic settings were changed.

 

[Tech Junky]

CM2000

I was using a MB8600 reliably for many years before switching away from cable but, there's also the MB8611 which has a 2.5 port on it. Unless you're planning on subscribing to higher than gig and have a router to plug it into it's kind of pointless. Once providers start rolling out FDX D4.0 will it actually make a difference. With the 8600 I put 2 ports into LACP and got the extra bandwidth that's over provisioned but, it's nice to pay 1/2 and get double the UL speed.

The quest for the highest speeds leads us down a rabbit hole and really isn't necessary unless you're actually using the speed / bandwidth. The additional BW is only really usable if you also unlock the data cap for $50/mo. When I broke the 1TB limit one month I pushed for the max amount of data to take advantage of the free month of overage and pegged it up to about 3TB on some binge DL's just to see how far I could push things.

 

[iFrogMac]

I was using a MB8600 reliably for many years before switching away from cable but, there's also the MB8611 which has a 2.5 port on it. Unless you're planning on subscribing to higher than gig and have a router to plug it into it's kind of pointless. Once providers start rolling out FDX D4.0 will it actually make a difference. With the 8600 I put 2 ports into LACP and got the extra bandwidth that's over provisioned but, it's nice to pay 1/2 and get double the UL speed.

The quest for the highest speeds leads us down a rabbit hole and really isn't necessary unless you're actually using the speed / bandwidth. The additional BW is only really usable if you also unlock the data cap for $50/mo. When I broke the 1TB limit one month I pushed for the max amount of data to take advantage of the free month of overage and pegged it up to about 3TB on some binge DL's just to see how far I could push things.

I already went to unlimited. I felt like with streaming / smart home plus larger downloads on the computer, etc a TB wouldn't go far. The biggest debate has been paying once for a modem or renting to ensure if something happens it's replaced / fixed for free under the rental terms vs being responsible if I pay for a modem up front. As far as multi gig, I have no way to take advantage of it all my ports are with 10/100, or 10/100/1000, and I max at 80Mhz for wifi devices. So having a multi gig port will probably be a waste of money until I can actually take advantage of it. The RT-AX86U is probably also overkill for me, but, I was interested in having control over the settings. Not that I need overly powerful hardware for my networking needs for the time being. That's one thing that irritated me about Cox, I didn't get unlimited data by default like I did spectrum. I thought data caps were only for cell phones, but I see cable doing it more and more too now. My heaviest data need would be local streaming, e.g. watching the copies of my movies / tv I ripped to Plex, and other solutions. I don't even need an internet connection for that. The gigabit internet connection is nice for dealing with large files such as software updates, etc. Having the extra bandwidth is nice too for a lot of little traffic from multiple devices. My plan at this point is to give it a couple months to see how it works out, and then adjust accordingly.

 

[Tech Junky]

watching the copies of my movies / tv I ripped to Plex, and other solutions.

Sounds like maybe looking into FWA like T-Mobile / VZW might be a better idea than dumping money into a cable modem. $50/mo with no data caps. Or less if you bundle a voice line with them. VZW's been spamming my mail with $25/mo offers lately but, having played with their service before it didn't do very well for me at least when TMO hits up to 600/100 and VZW hardly handled double digits and in some locations single digits.

Those update speeds aren't important and are like watching paint dry anyway since after it downloads you still have to wait for the OS to process it. If it takes an extra minute to DL the update that's not going to speed up the application of it to the system. I just block them all by DNS with pihole and select when or what I want to update maybe once a month whenever there's a cumulative update that encompasses all of the bs that MSFT is pushing onto systems. Easier to reviews multiple changes in a single update and check for others posting issues related to the changes.

 

[Crimliar]

Just as a heads-up. If you are using WiFi Smart Bulbs but are still turning the power on and off with regular wall switches, some can take up to a minute to appear on the network when powered on!

Regards the comments that are bound to flow: Some of us have partners with OCD!

 

[OzarkEdge]

Regards the comments that are bound to flow: Some of us have partners with OCD!

Who has the OCD... the one installing WiFi lightbulbs or the one still using the wall switches?

OE

 

[iFrogMac]

Just as a heads-up. If you are using WiFi Smart Bulbs but are still turning the power on and off with regular wall switches, some can take up to a minute to appear on the network when powered on!

Regards the comments that are bound to flow: Some of us have partners with OCD!

Not using the wall switch here, the bulbs will randomly just loose connection. I found some threads on Reddit about Wiz bulbs disconnecting and their solution is to reserve the bulb's IP in the router's DHCP settings so they're static. So giving that a try for a few days to see. As for the other suggestions, I've been keeping an eye out for VZW's 5G internet service as I have them for my cell phone. I do know, whatever service I would go with over Cox would have to be wireless, and would not require installed hardware outside the apartment. I could also cut back on my plan from Cox as well go down to 500 Mbps as I had 400 from Spectrum for a few years without issues. It was only the last year I was there, I decided to try gig service. While it's nice, for the vast majority of activities, it made very little difference. That's why I said I need to see my regular needs now in the new apartment to make a good informed decision. So will give it a couple months to really see what comes up.

 

[Tech Junky]

VZW's 5G internet service as I have them for my cell phone.

Good chance then to snag it for $25/mo. If you're happy with the phone speed the fwa should be about the same in performance.