Hopefully someone can help this very non tech grasshopper!

1. Have BT homehub (older style) which connects to my laptop fine
2. Tried to connect my S4 via wifi to it and it keeps saying unable to establish IP
3. Was working fine on IPAD (work one) but since coming back from holidays, this will also not connect and I am forced to connect to Bt wifi with fon, which is substandard as it keeps dropping
4. Spoke to BT, they checked the lines - all seemed fine, but told me I would have to pay for further help as it sounds like a network problem?

Has anyone experienced this before and what is the solution please?
thanks in advance

An obvious one but at least its an answer, make sure the wireless channels are in the range of 1 to 11 only. Also give it the full reset treatment.

Probably nothing to do with either of them but at least its a bump.

And here's another bump on a related issue

Over the last couple of months the BT WiFi connection in our house has become very unreliable. Drops out for minutes or even hours and then unexpectedly reconnects. Applies to all devices equally.

Now this may sound daft but could it be due to the weather we've been having? ( I have been fobbing my daughter off with this excuse )

If it's not the weather, can anyone suggest what the likely cause may be? It's infuriating........

Thanks in advance

I think you're probably both suffering from the poor quality routers that ISP's hand out.

A cheap router will at best last a couple of years and then begin to fail, mainly through overheating.

If you want another router from BT you could ask, but expect to have to sign up for another 12 months. I always use my own routers no matter which ISP I'm with.

Evidence or references?

I have a customer still on a BT HH 1.0. Still working fine. Additionally I have not come across ISP router being any worse than anything else. In fact I have an old TalkTalk supplied router running quite happily as an Ethernet switch at home and it must be at least six years old.

Suppose the 8 I've binned in the past 12 years could count as evidence?

You can't really compare a the £40 routers ISP's supply to high-end Linksys, Fritzbox or Drayteks. The new routers are using the latest dual band chipsets (some can even run ADSL, VDSL and 4G at the same time).

The bad performance of the HomeHub wireless chipsets could probably be corrected by reinstalling the firmware, If BT didn't make it so difficult to find copies of it.

The most ridiculous thing I've come across recently is the Huawei HG612 VDSL modem BT were supplying before the HomeHub5. It came with the user interface crippled so that the end user couldn't see any connection stats? With the factory firmware installed it's actually quite a good router.

I've got into the habit of buying a new router every 18 months or so anyway, It's surprising how fast the tech changes.

Something similar happened to me last week.

I have the following connected via cable to a HH3 on BT Infinity: -

1 x Sky HD Box
1 x Three Home Signal box
1 x Bluray Player
1 x NAS

The following are normally connected via WiFi

1 x TV
2 x Sky HD Boxes
2 x Laptops
1 x Desktop
1 x Printer
1 x CCTV
1 x Galaxy S2

Last week I was downloading various programmes to all 3 Sky boxes. Whilst this was going on I tried to connect one of the laptops via wifi. It refused point blank to connect. This only happens whilst I was downloading to the Sky boxes. After stopping the Sky downloads the laptop would connect.

Annoying!

I had this problem too. The HH3 is really lame when you stream a lot, or have lots of devices connected.

Get a HH5 (if you pay for it, you don't have to recontract). It's £50 and is actually a good router for the money.

A new third party router, or buy a HomeHub 5. Older hubs (specifically versions 2 and 3) seem to have reliability issues with wifi (especially when one device is streaming).

If you are technically minded - check that DHCP is still enabled on your existing hub.

Or reset it to the factory default (which will re-enable DHCP) (usually a hole on the back, push a hairpin/something similar in while it's on for 30 seconds) and see if that resolves your issue.

This is a problem that I have had on a home hub 2 on a number of occasions. I try to connect a new WiFi device and find that it connects to the local network but has no Internet access. It recently happened with a new smart TV. Doing a factory reset on the home hub has fixed the problem every time.

I have read your post and I am having exactly the same problems which started around 5th/6th January. Re-setting the hub works, but after having to do that every day I finally rang BT. They suggested manually changing the channels to 1, 6, or 11. There are 13 channels available, but he explained that by using a gap of five between reduces the chance of inter channel interference. As the hub is a smart hub, I thought this defeated the object somewhat as I thought it would automatically scan for a better channel if one became congested for some reason. However I tried that to no avail. I rang BT again and they conducted a series of remote tests, not sure what exactly, but they said that they could detect REIN (Repetitive Electrical Impulse Noise) interference which was the likely cause of the wireless problem. I should say that all of the equipment I have connected via Ethernet cable works fine still (play station, BT TV, desk top PC) it is only the wireless devices (Ipad, Printer, Smart TV) that have the problem connecting. It happens at any time of the day, there is no specific pattern to the drop outs. I am now waiting for someone to come out to see if they can determine what the problem is. I don't know if it re-connects itself if left for a while, as I have not been patient enough to wait and see.
Last edited by Clif_Cordiner : 28-01-2015 at 07:53

The advice to use channels 1, 6 and 11 is only really applicable when you have total control over all the WiFi equipment around you. Then you can set the different networks to different channels to avoid mutual interference.

Completely redundant however when there are 20 or more competing networks in your immediate vicinity and you can only control one of them. Pointless switching to channel 1 if the world and his wife is also on channel 1.

First thing I would do is install inSSIDer to investigate the WiFi environment around you.

http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/inssider.html

That will show you what other networks are sharing the airspace around you and whether there is any relatively clear space you can use. Trouble is unless you live in the back of beyond there are likely to be WiFi networks all over the place and it is almost inevitable you will have to share a channel with several others. The trick is to find the weakest signals to share with so your signal is not too badly affected.

Following on from my earlier post, BT sent someone out, and after carrying out a number of tests on both the line and the equipment, he determined that it was the hub (a home hub 3) that was at fault. The wireless part of it was failing. He replaced it with a HH5, and after 6 days I have had no further problems, so I think I can safely say that was the problem.