FUCKING ROUTER/comcast gateway modem hates my Roku for some reason

[sylvie]

I need help

For some reason my Roku suddenly has a disagreement with my router/network and it's an odd one. I'm not very knowledgeable on this stuff.

Roku kicked me off the network at some point last week or so. OK whatever, happens sometimes. Went to reconnect and it won't do it. OK weird. Reset the router like usual when something fucking stupid is happening and it usually fixes it.

Roku still won't connect to it so I'm like OK maybe I fried my Roku or something. So to see if the issue was really my Roku, I turned on my phone's wireless hotspot and tried to connect to that. Roku connected flawlessly!

So then I'm like oh god, now I need to try to talk to fucking Comcast probably.

I tried going to my router's IP address and wasn't able to guess my admin username/password to sign into my router, but Xfinity has this fucked up kid-glove way of doing something similar called "xFi" or some insane shit.

I found a way to rename my network and change its password. Renaming my network and changing my network's password fixes the issue, the Roku will connect flawlessly to my network and stay connected literally until it gets turned off or goes into standby mode. Then it will not reconnect, and I will have to redo this whole fucking process

I'm not much of a server lass, like I said, so my only assumption here is that for some deep-rooted reason, my network is blacklisting my Roku's MAC address after a successful sign-in, but for some reason it is letting it connect one time before blacklisting it. No idea if this is really whats happening but it's fucking retarded that there's seemingly some dedicated system in place by my network to prevent this one particular Roku from connecting to it.

Things to note:

- I have another, even older Roku in my bedroom that does NOT have this issue at all.
- this is mostly for @666ela so any nerds reading this should consider it a "princess rescue" type operation.
- Comcast is both retarded and insane, seems like my only option in that vein is to have a fucking technician come here and help me troubleshoot it, and this will probably result in him pretending to test a bunch of voltages, use the word "enhance" or "booster", and then give me a new router for a secret charge added to my bill later after lying about it being free

 

[SpamYouToDeath]

Are you doing anything silly with repeaters or multiple hotspots? Does the Roku work reliably when plugged in with an Ethernet cable?

What if you just delete/wipe the WiFi settings on the Roku without touching the router? What if you wipe the router (and restore the last working settings) without touching the Roku?

Also, in general - never, ever rent equipment from the cable company. Go buy your own modem and router. It pays for itself in under a year.

 

[neo_mao]

My wife won’t touch my Roku unless I wash my router first. She says wiping isn’t good enough...

 

[sylvie]

Are you doing anything silly with repeaters or multiple hotspots?

Nope

Does the Roku work reliably when plugged in with an Ethernet cable?

It's a small model and doesn't have an ethernet port, but since it connects to a hotspot flawlessly I imagine it has the capability to connect to it just like it used to

What if you just delete/wipe the WiFi settings on the Roku without touching the router?

Tried this. Did not work. I factory reset the entire Roku and loaded it from scratch

What if you wipe the router (and restore the last working settings) without touching the Roku?

I don't think I have done this but I did make the router forget the device and whatnot. Should I try to find settings that "factory reset" the modem/router combo?

Also, in general - never, ever rent equipment from the cable company. Go buy your own modem and router. It pays for itself in under a year.

Yeah, thing is last time I tried to have my own router, there were so many issues with it and then Comcast's way of fixing it was just giving me their fucking router anyway. TBH my internet works great almost all the time except for this little Roku problem. I did successfully steal a router/modem from Comcast but I believe I threw it away, assuming that once I plugged it in, it would trigger some kind of theft prevention on their end

 

[sylvie]

Oh, one thing to note as well

I believe what caused this issue for some reason was streaming music from my laptop to a streaming service. After I did this for the first time in a while, the Roku connection was fucked. I considered it being a bandwidth usage thing but my account isnt showing over-use and I'm only streaming audio for a few hours so I don't think it would use much, however my network may have "determined" something about this

 

[daskrabs]

Seems kinda unlikely to be bandwidth related since you have to get up into the 100's of GB/month before they do anything. I feel like they would notify you if they're throttling you.

Getting admin access to the router's config page will tell you if your Roku's IP or MAC has any bullshit settings or rules that would impact. I'd look for firmware updates for the Roku first. If no new FW, and no offending rules in the router config, I'd consider ditching the Roku for an Nvidia Shield TV. Yes, it costs a bit more, but trust me, it's worth it. Plus you can play games on it.

BTW, thanks for the shout-out in chat. (I guess this new site notifies the user when that happens.)

 

[famicommander]

All I can say is good luck. I bought a new modem last week and spent 2 hours on the phone with Comcast getting them to activate it. Brutal.

 

[sylvie]

Seems kinda unlikely to be bandwidth related since you have to get up into the 100's of GB/month before they do anything. I feel like they would notify you if they're throttling you.

Getting admin access to the router's config page will tell you if your Roku's IP or MAC has any bullshit settings or rules that would impact. I'd look for firmware updates for the Roku first. If no new FW, and no offending rules in the router config, I'd consider ditching the Roku for an Nvidia Shield TV. Yes, it costs a bit more, but trust me, it's worth it. Plus you can play games on it.

BTW, thanks for the shout-out in chat. (I guess this new site notifies the user when that happens.)

Yeah I don't think its bandwidth at all. And yes they do notify me when I run out (I did it once, dont ask how....) and let me buy a small amount more.

Yeah I just need to figure out what the fuck the default or admin creds are for the router address which is frustrating. Any idea how I might find out? In the past with different stuff it is usually just like 'admin' and 'password' or admin/admin . Fucking shit locks you out if you fuck up too much so its a pain in the ass to trial and error

If I cant fix it I will prob just try to get a different Roku, not too interested in the Nvidia TV.

And no problem. Roker is pissing me off his avatar looks too similar to yours

All I can say is good luck. I bought a new modem last week and spent 2 hours on the phone with Comcast getting them to activate it. Brutal.

When I was on the phone with one of those people the other night it was this terrifying-sounding child slave. She tried to get me to turn off my router but she wouldn't stop asking me scripted "personal questions", like she was fucking obsessed with them and was actually prioritizing these questions over figuring out what i wanted help with

 

[famicommander]

When I was on the phone with one of those people the other night it was this terrifying-sounding child slave. She tried to get me to turn off my router but she wouldn't stop asking me scripted "personal questions", like she was fucking obsessed with them and was actually prioritizing these questions over figuring out what i wanted help with

When I called it dumped me into their automated phone tree. When the prompt asked me to say what I was calling for, I said "activate a modem" and the prompt replied that their records show my modem is active (the old one I was replacing) so then it just kept sending me through loops for a bit. Took me a good 15 minutes to get to a live human, and then yeah, they were all about this script. Tried to sell me home phone service, tried to get me to switch my cell phone service over to them, asked a whole bunch of forced small talk questions while he kept me on the line waiting for the box to power cycle, etc. Do you play online games, is this a work or office connection, what kinds of stuff do I stream, etc.

The guy got the sense that I was getting annoyed but he pretty much said he had to keep going through the questions until the process was done. Literally all I needed him to do was send the activation signal.

 

[sylvie]

One time I had a Comcast call where the dude just sucked my dick the whole time without me even trying, fixed everything remotely and even gave me a better package and credit towards my account

 

[daskrabs]

Try googling the make and model of the router plus "default password" or similar. If you find it and it doesn't work, do a factory reset.

 

[Heinz]

Alright well as a certified telecommunications technician and after reading through the discussion here so far I have decided the following: Your shit's all fucked up.

In all seriousness I'd replace the router as you have already established the Roku operates correctly with your wifi hotspot.

Protip: All carrier supplied routers are sub $100 pieces of absolute shit. Might work for 5 years, might die in a week. They give you no control with buggy and severely limited firmware to boot.

You say you have to call the carrier (comcast) to activate your router? Do they not hand over your auth credentials for a DIY router install? That or it's mac address locked?

Here we have many forms like fiber, coax and regular telephone wire VDSL on a single national backbone. It's all designed so you can just plug any compatible router in to that connection (mostly) and away you go. For those that understand, it's all DHCP!

 

[SpamYouToDeath]

Here we have many forms like fiber, coax and regular telephone wire VDSL on a single national backbone. It's all designed so you can just plug any compatible router in to that connection (mostly) and away you go. For those that understand, it's all DHCP!

USA uses DOCSIS, for those on cable modem, and it's mostly plug-and-play. You can get a variety of modems for ~$150 and they usually just work. Doesn't stop the cable company from up-selling you on their shitty $10/month modem+router combo rental.

 

[Heinz]

USA uses DOCSIS, for those on cable modem, and it's mostly plug-and-play. You can get a variety of modems for ~$150 and they usually just work. Doesn't stop the cable company from up-selling you on their shitty $10/month modem+router combo rental.

Yeah we use DOCSIS too if you're lucky to live in an area that had cable tv deployed.