Node N130 interferes with other networking.

Answered
Ed Form
  • Edited

Good morning,

When I connect my Node N130 to either of my two internet routers - a Tenda HC1200 V12 or the standard TalkTalk Sagecom device - I get the same, infuriating problem. I plug in to the internet router using an ethernet cable and within seconds I can see the Node in the Android App and play music from Qobuz etc. This does not fail or mess about in any way.

But, the rest of the network behaves very badly. After I launch the Android app for the first time, I can no longer see any of my webservers - the router itself which sits at 192.168.1.1, the printer at 192.168.1.253, etc.

If I power off the router and power it on again, connectivity to the various webservers is restored until I run the App, after which it disappears again.

I had the same issue with an iFi Zen Streamer and sent it back for a refund, but now I find the Node I replaced it with doing the same thing. Can anyone suggest the cause or a cure?

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Comments

9 comments

Date Votes
  • Official comment
    Seppi Evans
    Hi-Res

    Simply... its your network configuration that causing the issue with Bluesound and your previous streamer.

    You have two router devices, one needs to be connected to the internet with all services running such as NAT and DHCP, the second router need to be put into bridge mode but in most cases the second router even if it has a bridge mode may still have NAT running which causes issues with devices being discoverable.

    Personally I would only ever recommend a single router in a domestic environment. If you need better wifi coverage you can turn wi-fi off on the router and connect a mesh system such as those from Google or Nest etc. If you are using the additional router just for the network ports then buy a cheap switch which in the UK can be bought for less than £20

     

  • Ed Form

    Sorry, I was unclear - I only have one router connected. My point was that the same failure occurs whichever router I use.

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  • Seppi Evans
    Hi-Res

    Do you have any wifi extenders or switches connected to your Router please?

     

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  • Ed Form

    No extenders or switches but one pair of mains networking adapters - one directly cabled to the router and the other cabled to a small PC that I use only for TV. I do have a switch and was going to try connecting that to the router and connecting the Node to it.

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  • Seppi Evans
    Hi-Res

    Pretty simple then networking wise, I would suggest for temp testing you do unplug the Homeplugs (mains extenders) .

    Now power off (not just standby) any device connected to the router (phones, tables PC etc.) and power off the router as well. Give it 30 seconds and power on the router, waiting until its fully up and running.

    Next power on just the NODE and the device you use to control the NODE, hopefully as you have done similar before the NODE will be working. Then other devices but not the extenders and test to see if everything is OK.

    At this point (if working) log into your router and assign static IPs to your Bluesound device(s) and controller (Android?).

    Then turn on the Homeplugs and the PC... and see what happens. Homeplugs do have a place but they often do strange things with networking addresses and can cause issues by pretending to be other devices or a device like your PC gets a new address.

    If you ever power off the router then you must power off all devices connected. Basically the router issues an IP address but when powered off / rebooted no longer has knowledge of this. The router then issues the IP address to another device despite it being in use already and can take hours to days to correct itself (depending on the DHCP server settings.)

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  • Ed Form

    Thanks Seppi - I'll work through that and report back.

    Regards

    Ed Form

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  • Ed Form
    • Edited

    I found the solution - silly error on my part. I had the DHCP server settings able to hand out addresses across the entire range 2 to 254. I found this while I was working through your recommended diagnosis routines and the moment I restricted the range of DHCP to 2-50 the problem went away.

    After adding a NAS to the system today as a music store, I now have webservers in the network for Internet Router [Fixed 192.168.1.1], Xerox printer [Fixed 192.168.1.253], and NAS [DHCP 192.168.1.6], all accessible and BlueSound controllers on both my Motorola Android phone - [WiFi DHCP 192.168.1.9] and my desktop PC [DHCP 192.168.1.3]. There's also another phone and a tablet hooked in which I haven't bothered to check out. After several reboots of the various devices and restarts of the BlueSound control software on PC and phone, I can still contact all the webservers.

    Thanks Seppi - kicking me into being systematic about the thing did the trick :)

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  • Seppi Evans
    Hi-Res
    • Edited

    Well, so glad you you got there but puzzled why restraining the DHCP scope helped. Reserved / static IPs are a must and personally have always helped.

    Edit… ah guessing there were static IP from the scope previously assigned.

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  • Ed Form

    That's exactly the case - two items with internally fixed IP addresses were in the DHCP scope.

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