Time Warner Cable - Legacy → [Help still needed] Arris DG860A WIRELESS connection issues.

MODEM: Arris DG860A
OS: Windows 7
--HOME network only. There is only one modem (which is also a router itself) and 4 wireless devices connected to the network--

I really think something is wrong with the router settings, or just the way the modem/router is set up in general...

I play a video game which I need to be stable at most times and it gets frustrating every time I get the huge lag spikes. It will still show me as connected for some reason, but I won't be able to browse or do anything for a minute.

This goes with ALL my WIRELESS devices but NOT the host
(did I get that right?) computer that is connected with ethernet. I already tested it and the one connected by ethernet is completely fine, but any wireless devices get messed up!

I was also checking the settings (Not changing anything without knowledge) and I see that on the LAN settings,
---it says NAT MODE, and the mode is "ROUTED WITH NAT" the other options are "BRIGED" or "ROUTED WITHOUT NAT", is the default mode fine the way it is? --

Forgive me because I do not really know much about it, but I think it has something to do with the router settings right? If I'm wrong, I apologize..

Now, Firewall settings...

Firewall Enable/Disable
Enable Firewall

(it is DISABLED by DEFAULT... ? )

DoS Attack Protection
Enable DoS Attack Protection Firewall

((ENABLED, but I have heard DDOS attacks are when somebody sends packets to your modem and overflows it causing it to disconnect, but I have NEVER seen this type of "firewall mode" in any router, which makes me wonder, how exactly does it protect you from DDOS attacks? It doesn't even say how it works on the settings))

Block Pings
Enable Ping Blocking

((ENABLED again, should this be disabled?))

IPSec Pass Through
Enable IPSec Pass Through

(ENABLED...)

PPTP Pass Through
Enable PPTP Pass Through

(ENABLED)

L2TP Pass Through
Enable L2TP Pass Through

(ENABLED)

Block Fragmented IP Packets
Enable Block Fragmented IP Packets

(DISABLED...)

Additional information of my WIRELESS SETTINGS:
(advanced)
--Wireless Network Settings--
Wireless Mode >>> B/G/N MIXED
BG Protection >> ENABLED
Beacon Interval >> 100
DTIM Interval >> 1
RTS Threshold >> 2347
Fragment Threshold >> 2346
Frame Burst >> DISABLED
WMM Power Save mode >> DISABLED

---80211n Specific Settings---
Operation Mode >> MIXED MODE
Channel Bandwidth >> 20 MHz
Guard Interval >> 400ns
MCS >> AUTO

(Again, I only post this just in-case someone who knows about it can tell me whether it should be the way it is, or changed)

just wondering if any of those settings should be changed to make wireless gaming easier, or wireless usage in general...

If someone can help me please let me know if you need more information, and how or what I can post to help this situation, please let me know!

Turn off dos protection.

Do you need B/G mode? If not go strictly N.
Try changing the channel if your area has a lot of wifi.

Then i would either swap the modem, or bridge it and buy my own router.

can you give a little detail on why DOS protection should be turned off?

Also, I always keep my channel on 11 because it gives me the highest score on INSSIDER3

now for the B/G/N mode, if I change it to strictly "N" mode, it won't affect the host computer attached with the ethernet correct? I know that sounds stupid, but I'm nieve when it comes to the whole 802.11 thing. I assume it's only WIRELESS cards not ALL internet card or jack ports right? Sorry again if that sounded stupid.

Anyways, I will give it a shot, as far as you telling me about turning off DOS protection, can you give me detail on that? Does it actually help but interfere with your connections performance or something?
I'm just worried though regarding the firewall cause it doesn't make sense. The firewall was DISABLED by default, and if I turn off DOS protection, it just seems weird.

Just let me know if I'm TOO paranoid about attacks and that I should not worry, because my last modem that was replaced a few weeks ago was extremely terrible... EXTREMELY and I assumed it was probably breached into some how. (it was a old ass Netgear modem though, but still, you won't believe how bad it was)

Thanks Jabbu

your getting good advice why dont u follow it and try. router defaults on channels 1 or 6 or 11 why would you keep it on 11?

I am taking his advice I just want to know more about DOS protection and if its even safe to turn it off especially if I play online games on this device.

I keep it on channel 11, because I just said it gives me the best score in INSSIDER rather than channel 1 and 6... so that is why I keep 11, because 1 and 6 are worst... not being rude but please read what I say before assuming things.

My main concern is being told to do something from someone I don't really know who they are, and more detail on why DOS "PROTECTION" should be turned off..

again not being rude, I respect if whoever is replying knows A LOT about networking etc. but like I said, I do not know who that person replied to me was...

as for changing the network to "N" I did that... I still get lag spikes, though I'm refusing to turn DOS protection off until I can find more detail on how it works, or if it actually interferes with online gaming... because before my IP was changed (When I had my super old out-dated modem), the disconnects were extremely severe to the point where I assumed I was a victim of DDOS attacks.. Then got a new modem not too long ago, everything was fine, disconnects are not severe but it's not pleasant either. Something that never happens at a friends house with the same exact ISP but different router... when I would play there I would NEVER have issues with 60 minute online continuous gameplay stress testing.

The modem options at my friends house does NOT even have certain things MY modem does, so that's why I posted all these new settings I haven't seen on my Original Post.. Just makes me really concern that the configurations need to be fixed, THAT is why I'm here... to get help.

Doesn't make sense why it happens at my house because the router is much bigger and newer, and the TWC who came over my house many times already said wiring is correct

(BUT said default settings should be fine as it is... meaning, don't touch it, just deal with it... 'sigh' ), etc.

Thanks to anyone who can give me advice, but please don't reply and tell me "JUST DO IT" without any detail..

all I want is for my wireless network to work to its full potential like other people I know...thank you

Generally speaking, the built-in routing functions of modem/router combos are complete shit. The less responsibility you can give them, the better.

Just by being behind a router that shares a public IP, you already have a pretty signifiant natural firewall to protect you from unsolicited attacks. Inbound connection requests made to your public IP have nowhere to go unless you explicitly allow them in the port forwarding rules (or are running a UPnP service that has requested a port forward).

I've never seen much value in the "SPI firewall" or "DDOS" protection options. I don't doubt that they might help curtail certain types of attacks, but I don't think those attacks are at all common in practice for home users. With an asymmetrical home broadband connection, if you're getting DDOSed, there's probably not much you can do but weather out the storm or change the MAC address so you pull a new IP.

Software firewalls on your PC serve a different, more important function, and that's to watch *what programs* are initiating and accepting connections. This can help you spot when unexpected processes (malware) try to communicate with the outside world. So if you say, accidentally installed a trojan screen saver that was trying to share your bank login password, the firewall could jump in and put a stop to it because it sees that an unknown process (screensaver.exe) is trying to communicate with badguys.com. Nothing in your SOHO router is really going to be able to accomplish this as effectively, because it has no idea what applications initiated the connections.

So, I'd suggest getting a good security suite on your PC and turn off the junk in the router.

I'm a much bigger fan of routers that can have DD-WRT, OpenWRT, or other community-developed software loaded into them. Now you have a lot of eyeballs looking for quality issues, and people care about fixing them. Motorola and Arris are going to sell hundreds of cablemodems even if their software is full of bugs. My Motorola SBG6580 would crash and reboot if you just specified a wifi SSID when it was fresh out of the box and being installed for the first time. That would fail any basic QA smoke check process. That problem got corrected once the modem pulled down new firmware, but the fact that it shipped with such a glaring bug speaks volumes about how much Motorola cares about the quality of their product. From what I've read the alternatives aren't much better.

I'm done ranting now. Good luck!

I appreciate the response.

and yes, I do actually have firewalls, virus/malware/spyware protection apps (one that came with my PC) and a few free ones, and scanners like AVG FREE and MalawareBytes

but then again, I only use this specific PC for gaming which is why I hate having disconnects and I keep this PC clean as possible. My other devices such as tablets, phones and consoles though, hopefully nothing wrong can happen with them.

The PC connected to ethernet however, which is my uncles, is old, but I already installed anti virus stuff for him a long time ago... it's just the fact that his PC literally is some old Gateway or something from the late 1990s (exaggerating), lets just hope all he does is check his email or do business type stuff since I barely see him home. (He keeps the modem in his room because that's where it was originally put by the ISP when I was in houston. I COULD have it moved to my room but I don't care that much, this is not even my house)
Also, I know about resetting the modem once in a while, I already do that by command from the 192.168.0.1 thing, has a "reset option" not only that, my uncle resets it every 2 days just like I told him, and I can actually tell if he did it or not because my wireless IP will change...

So it's good to hear that the modem firewall settings are less important than from my PC itself.

So OK, I will test it with that function off, now that more people are starting to agree with that, so thank you. I have a few more questions though.

I've seen these settings on my modem that I have NOT seen on a friends modem.

IPSec Pass Through
PPTP Pass Through
L2TP Pass Through

which are ALL ENABLED and the information I try to google hurts my nieve networking brain. I honestly don't understand it, BUT, I have found information that some modems have them DISABLED by default,
however mines are ENABLED.

I want to point that I'm in a simple home network, and I assume those "pass through" things are for business networks?

If you can still help me out with that last bit DJROBX I would appreciate it!

I know you said to disable "ALL" the junk from modem's firewall, I disabled the DDOS Protection already, but I don't know of those last 3 settings that were enabled by default are needed for home networking or not.
I'm only curious because "passthrough" doesn't even sound like some sort of "Firewall" meaning to me... it just sounds weird. Yes it IS under firewall settings but I just don't want to be making a big mistake.

As for DOS I have turned it off, changed the network from BGN to N as suggested by the 2nd poster (if it was even necessary) my speed seems to have been 11,000 download, to 17,000 download, so thank you for that.

.I just want my wireless to perform 100% like my friends..

Again my apologies for making WALLS of texts, as well as constant nagging

I think it is going well, really better than earlier except I didn't get much of a chance. I will post here until Monday if I get results or not. Thanks for the above suggested. If you can still give info on the last 3 settings that I posted about please let me know. Thanks

SORRY DOUBLE POST

OK I got a chance to test it for a few hours today and even expecting a lot of traffic on saturday the connection seems very stable compared to before.

Thank you for all your help

U try changing channel?

IPSec Pass Through
PPTP Pass Through
L2TP Pass Through

These are for VPN connections. You can turn them off if you don't use a VPN.

Hmm. VPN I know means Virtual private network , though I don't fully understand how the process works.
Does it affect wireless connection any way? If I were to disable them, can I still access the internet through wireless devices as well as configure my modem using wireless and not ethernet?

IF I still can, would there be security issues?

Would my ISP be able to access my modem settings from their end?
(One time wireless wasn't working, my uncle was not homr, and my ISP said they resetted and enabled wireless access on my modem from THEIR PC's)
UNLESS the above mentioned is an example of VPN, I should probably leave it on in-case theres another incident where I cannot access my modem, if I'm even correct. Am I?

Its just the fact it says passthrough, what are the possibilities someone can get my information, and do some vpn hacking thing from their end, or is that very unlikely and I'm being paranoid?

Sorry for all the questions but I'm sure if these can be answered with some detail, but easy for me to understand
(since I'm no pro when it comes to networking)
I would appreciate it.

Please help, if you think a setting should be changed for best wireless connection!

Ok, I just really want this to be fixed, considering I can only play
my online game with my team around 7 after work which is the only time I get to play for hours (depends)

Now, the people that suggested what I do above, it has helped my wireless connectivity to NOT completely drop, but the LAG SPIKES are still present..

Lag spikes make my normal 20ms, jump to 600 (at one point, a friend notified that my ping was 999 which I never knew was possible... technically that's just a short disconnect...)

Now, please read the whole thread if you decide to help me.

I will now attach pictures of some of my modem's settings, and I hope somebody can figure out what's wrong, what needs to be changed etc... I just really want to give as much information as I can, and IF you need more please post here!

I understand it's not peoples job to help, I don't know how I can repay all the people above that helped me but hopefully theres somebody out there who can help me figure this out! Time Warner, no offense to them, they already swapped my modem, made sure wiring is legit, signal levels legit... but wireless connection is literally, 60% stable... I know it is expected to have lag spikes ONCE IN A WHILE but damn!

I also understand that wireless online gameplay can be unpredictable, but this NEVER happens at my friends house (as I mentioned before) and he IS wireless as well. His ping is higher than mine but at least he never has lag spikes.
I'm not exaggerating anything, it's just extremely annoying to the point where I play so paranoid in the game (hard to explain what I mean by that), but lets stay on topic...

I also want to note, I do have anti virus, spyware, malyware programs all up to date, I have no suspicious programs that I assume may interfere, I don't even have that many to be honest.
My PC firewall settings are allowed and I have already fixed all the settings needed (IE. allowed programs etc)

i have NO IDEA WHY TWC does not disable this setting,,,"we" cant change it,,,only TWC can. if you have messed with this setting i strongly recommend doing a factory reset and start over. taking caution of NOT messing with that setting.
i also recommend getting a router from amazon, if you go this route CALL TWC to set the modem in bridge mode.

there are simply to many variables at play that can be at fault including your pc with virus or bad network drivers etc..the list goes on and on. try some of these things.

1. disable ALL firewalls running on that pc. if you have multiple firewall programs UNINSTALL them

2. disable ALL anti-virus software

3. run task manager in background on the networking tab while playing your game.

also check what ports are used for that game you may need to setup port forwarding..

it could also be your cable line with sporadic noise on it,,,again just way way to many variables

Oh ok... but I never messed with that setting.. and you didn't really answer much of the questions.. like in the pictures, I don't know if the the text is showing.

i still recommend doing a factory reset and start testing again,,,modems and routers simply dont make good combos imo

the NAT, BRIDGE, NAT/ROUTER is to turn the router function on or off which we CANNOT control or change, and it does not like being messed with by the end user..i messed with the setting on an arris, it does not work,,,only locks up modem and fail dhcp etc among other things..

have you tried doing static ip's and disabling dhcp?

have you tried your own router? if so did you call TWC to set the modem in bridge mode? if not then that = double NAT'ED = grief!

also this model's wireless reach SUCKS!!!!!! and this model hates working on wireless side...will lock up modem if you are to far away or start dumping a ton of packets....another note make sure your wireless is not open/shared

added,

do you have CATV with TWC? if yes are your cable boxes pixalating ever?

have you scanned your area for wireless devices running on channel xx??? my neighborhood has 10+ devices on channel 11 @ 2.4GHZ you want a channel with the least amount of devices and that is laptop inside doing this scan mind you

im in a room right next to it actually, it doesn't suck...

Open/Shared? how do I find out about that? I never seen that setting.

I have a cable amplifier, my cable doesn't pixilate.

yes, I have INSIDDER3 and I always switch channels for the best, but there are only like 6 total people around me depending on certain times... I don't think channel is the problem here, or if it is, it's the least to worry about

At this point I advise u call for service because your not technical enough to fix yourself and you have rf problem that can only be fix by TWC tech. Good luck.

I've already stated that time warner has told me the default settings should be fine, this was the day after they just came over to swap the modem, check wires, signal levels and

I have also said, the pc connected by ethernet does NOT have these disconnecting/lag spikes. It only happens on wireless devices.
Which is why I am here asking for help and advice. I know I'm not a techy, why else would I ask for help on a forum WHERE PEOPLE HELP?

Just saying...
For example, gaming or streaming, browsing will be disabled for a short while
( or never load) yet the ethernet pc remains normal. Tested this about 3 times already when I had keys to the room (long story, don't ask).

I honestly don't think there's a need to buy a 100 foot ethernet cable, or ask TWC to re-arrange the modem and transfer it into another room for a fee... I just don't think its worth it. Its annoying enough to pay $40 just for them to come and swap devices. I remember even asking the guy if things needed to be fixed in the settings.. all he did was enable the router and change the password to AES. Then assured me the modem restarting would stop now.
They DID....BUT there's only wireless problems now, not modem malfunctions.

They even called hearing of my issue ON the direct ISP forum help topics, after the swap and was told to get INSIDDER and change channels to the best one once in a while, I told them I already have it and have been using it. Then they told me to go to metageek and download this tool that checks connections deeper, they didn't tell me it would cost $600 bucks.

I refuse to mess around with settings unless someone here can help me determine a certain setting that might interrupt wireless signal.

It isnt extremely bad anymore after people had suggested some mod setting tweaks, but like I said, if the people I play with have the same isp, and are wireless but never have lag spikes, I know that its possible for me too.

Ill just continue to do some searching.

If somebody did look at the pictures, and read my situation, reply here with your thoughts. Thank you.