Router upgrade to wireless n ???

[tazman62]

To my knowledge Verizon does not offer wireless n... if this is correct can I purchase a higher end router which will support fios and replace Verizon's router??  I currently have (2) computers, (1) notebook, (1) ipad and (2) iphones and we watch streaming video.  Of course not all will be in use at the same time, however, if extreme cases up to 4 devices may be in use at the same time.  Currently I have the Actiontec MI424-WR Rev D router and I believe that I have 30 Mbps download and 20 Mbps upload.  Please provide any info, input or advice concerning my inquiry.  Thanks!!

[smith6612]

Verizon does offer Wireless N routers; specifically the ActionTec MI424-WR Rev. G router which has Gigabit and Wireless N capabilities. Good luck trying to get one though, as they're still pretty new and are only really being given out for the packages higher than 50Mbps/20Mbps in speed. But yes, you can replace Verizon's router with a router of your own. There's a pile of FAQs over at DSLReports on this subject that you can take a look at and decide how you want to set it up. I do suggest a move from MoCa to Ethernet for your connection to the ONT from the router though.

http://www.dslreports.com/faq/16077
http://www.dslreports.com/faq/verizonfios (look at networking and below)

[tazman62]

Thanks for your input and links... quite helpful and gives me an option to think about.

[timh3]

I just spoke with an online rep and was told when asking about the wireless N router:

Marie(12:17:47): Hello. Thank you for choosing Verizon and visiting our chat service. That router is not available yet.

[Hubrisnxs]

verizon is coming out with an n router that they intend to use for every speed plan, that is rev H.  rev G is being held for customers that order over 100 MB service.  

so don't plan on getting an N router from verizon anytime soon.    do yourself a favor like most of us, and go buy yourself an n router.  

[mschauber]

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@Hubrisnxs wrote:

verizon is coming out with an n router that they intend to use for every speed plan, that is rev H.  rev G is being held for customers that order over 100 MB service.  

so don't plan on getting an N router from verizon anytime soon.    do yourself a favor like most of us, and go buy yourself an n router.  

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What will be the difference between Rev G and Rev H?  I would hope that any router, moving forward, will have a gigabit switch, MIMO 802.11n and fixes for the various bugs in the previous versions.

Any idea why verizon is so reluctant to give Rev G routers out to existing customers?  Is it meerly a ploy to get us to upgrade to their 100/35 serivce, with is currently priced way too high to even be considered.?

Thanks.

[spacedebris]

Likely the reason they will not give it out to current customers is that they have a limited amount that they are holding for customers that get that speed.

The current routers are faster than any of the current internet plans (save that one 150 Mb plan). So current customers dont need the gigabit router.

And since Verizon doesnt officially support wireless nor guarantee wireless, G or N is all the same to them. As far as they are concerned they are the same thing. The only reason they are even moving to the N routers is that G routers are going out and are just too hard to get anymore. G was just the cheap router for so long and since Verizon doesnt care about wireless, they were just purchasing the cheap ones.

[mschauber]

I'm sure you are correct in that Verizon is trying to save money by buying very few of the Rev G routers while they exhaust their stock of old versions.  And at $200/month I'm sure the sign up for their new 150/35 package has been much slower than they would have liked.

But I would disagree that they aren't conerned about wireless.  They push wireless and the FREE wireless router as a huge selling point for their service.  They clearly support the basic wireless features of the router, you just have to look at their documentation, setup guides, etc to see that.  They don't support more advanced features, which include what I would consider basic features, like using WPA2-AES, choosing a better SSID (not using your address, your name, your dogs name, your DOB, the router make or model, etc, etc, etc,) wireless QOS above the defaults set in the router, and a miriad of other features.

And the fact that their technical support doesn't know the difference between 802.11g, 802.11n, 802.11n with MIMO is simply pathetic, regardless of what they formally support or not.  If you walk into a sushi restaurant and ask for unagi and the waiter/waitress replies "what is unagi?" are you going to stay there very long?  It doens't matter if they eat it, what matters is that they don't know the Japanese word for one of the most popular types of sushi in the US, eel.  A technical support representative should have a basic set of knowledge and skills, regardless of whether they are on garbage pickup or level 3 support that day.  Wireless is no longer a feature or 'nice to have', it's part of many peoples everyday technological life.  You can spend a couple of hundred dollars, possibly per run, to wire your house or you can use wireless.  You can put your ipad on the coffee table as shiny paperweight or you can connect it to your wireless network (since Steve Jobs decided it wasn't necessary for anyone to connect anything to his devices,) and use the thing.

Would you find it acceptable for a FiOS TV support technician to not know the difference between DVR and VOD?

In the last 10 years, actually going back to 1981, this world of screw the people/who needs a middle class and support/bail out big corporations has created the environment we live in where Verizon says to themselves, 'why waste money on routers with gigabit switches in them, our users won't know the difference for the most part and we have shareholders that will notice a penny difference in their dividend.'

Which brings me to the whole gigabit 'router' issue.....  Each unit has a 5 port switch built in.  One port has been designated for WAN and four for LAN.  I don't buy the "current customers dont need the giagbit router" bit.  The only things current subscribers don't need is a gigabit WAN port.  For those of us that live in a mostly wired network, the difference between transfer speeds on a 100mb switch and a 1000mb switch is huge.  Seconds in stead of minutes, minutes instead of hours, hours instead of days, days instead of weeks.  It absolutely makes a HUGE difference.  And yes, I could put a gigabit switch on the LAN and it SHOULDN'T affect internet speeds.  But I have tried unmanaged switches from 5 different manufactures and with everysingle one, I had a reduction in speeds between the Gb switch and the Actiontec.  VZN support simple said they don't support using such devices, that you are limited to the 4 ports on the Actiontec.  A good company line but doesn't explain why a simple network device would have no problems transfering data at a full Gb speed between all devices except the Actiontec, which of course is connected at 100Mbps, but unable to maintain full 35/35 speed between itself and the Actiontec.

I was even put on the phone with Actiontec twice, both times simply transfered to the Tech line, which requires you to give your Verizon tech id to get support, and the Verizon tech had already hung up.  I was able to convince them to give me the information I needed one of those times.  My question is, why aren't the Verizon techs put through a thurough training on the devices they are supposidly supporting?

Anyway, it's NYE and I just want to kick back and relax for the Time Square festivities get started, which luckily I can appreciate from the comfort of my own couch instead of walking outside and being squished amonst who knows how may thousands of people.

Happy New Year everyone.

[spacedebris]

oh, its not that the tech support doenst know what N is. sure they do know. But they dont support it. The limit for the wireless support at Verizon is 10 feet or line of sight. Which ever is less. They do not guarentee ANY speed with wireless. Sure it is a big selling point. And the sales people will push it trying to get you to sign up. But if you have problems with it? Just try and get someone to help you. I personally know several of the tech support people. They are VERY good at the technical aspects, but they are not allowed to help with anything beyond what Verizon says they can. And Verizon says that the limit of that support is 10 feet. Hell if your only 10 feet away, you may as well connect the ethernet cable and be done with it. Verizon specifically tells their tech people to limit their discussions on wireless and to not get into the N vs G with the customer. So its not that they dont know, they just dont get into it. For Verizon it just means, can you connect? if so thats it. period. It doenst matter if it is only dial up speed or full connection speed. The connection itself is where they stop. Speed, distance, internal networking, interfearance, those are beyond what Verizon will support so as far as the support goes, its a non issue. You want faster, greater distance, or better performance? Your on your own. Now if your wired, thats a different. But as far as wireless is concerned. its nearly non-existant.

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[eljefe2]

You can replace the Actiontec with another router but I found it much simpler to just turn off the Actiontec's wifi and run an inexpensive 802.11n router configured as a WAP and fed by one of the Acitontec's LAN ports.  I get 43 mb/s down 32 mb/s up via a wired or wifi connection.

I still have the default Verizon configuratin, including  the coax MoCA feed to the Actiontec, so if I ever have an issue that needs tech support I won't be hearing from Verizon "we don't support that router."

[tazman62]

Thanks for the info... pardon my inexperience when it comes to configuring the router but how do you go about disabling the wifi on the Actiontec MI424 Rev D router??  I agree with you... don't want to run into the "we don't support" issue if needed.

[lasagna]

Login to the router via a browser ... the router will be at:   http://192.168.1.1

The option to disable the wifi on the router can be found on the wireless settings page.

The best option is to disable wifi and use a second router as an access point.  

It doesn't take Verizon's router out of the loop from a support perspective and if you have TV service, unless your networking savvy and understand what is going on with the MoCA bridge to the LAN, etc. you probably don't want to outright replace Verizon's router (no replacement router will provide the needed MoCA bridge -- and while you can purchase a device to bridge the local LAN onto a MoCA coax connection to support this need for the Set-Top boxes, it's really not worth the hassle.

[Justin46]

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@DblSides wrote:

Thanks for the info... pardon my inexperience when it comes to configuring the router but how do you go about disabling the wifi on the Actiontec MI424 Rev D router??  I agree with you... don't want to run into the "we don't support" issue if needed.

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1) Log into the router (ignore the extra asterisks that are displayed while you type)

2) Click on the Wireless Settings icon at the top

3) Click on Basic Security Settings on the left side

4) Click on the Off button in #1: Turn Wireless ON

5) Scroll down and click on Apply

6) Logout

__________________________________
Justin
Verizon FiOS TV, Internet, and phone
QIP6416-P1, IMG 1.8, Build 02.54
Keller, TX 76248

[tazman62]

Justin... thanks for the step by step instructions, I'm sure the process will be quite simple.  Now for the not so good news... A verizon tech originally installed my router and honestly I don't know the user name or password.  I have never had any issues or reasons to login to the router until now.  So... that's both good news and bad news all in a nutshell. 

Is there a way to retrieve or reset the info needed??  Please kindly advise.

Thanks again and Happy Holidays to you.

[Justin46]

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@DblSides wrote:

Is there a way to retrieve or reset the info needed??  Please kindly advise.

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Probably the easiest thing to do is reset the router; this should set the name and password back to the defaults of "admin" and "password".There is a reset button on the back of the router. However, if anybody (the Verizon tech?) did any unique configuration work for you,those changes will be lost (probably not an issue for you as normally no configuration work is needed or done at initial installation).

Now if you want, before you try the reset, you might try "admin" for the name and then use the WEP key as the password (Edit: someone else posted saying serial number of the router, I thought it was the WEP key but apparently it is the serial number). You can find the WEP key (and serial number) on the label on the router (case is important here).

Or maybe somehow your router escaped the automated password change Verizon did over the network some time back; in that case it will be "admin" and probably "password1" ( password1 is what most of the Verizon techs changed the password to during installation).

And last, if nobody ever logged into the router, including the Verizon tech when he did the install, and Verizon did not change things over the network, it should be "admin" and "password" (Edit: apparently no login is now needed for the first login after a reset, but you will be required to enter login info for future use) .

One of the above should get you logged into the router. Just keep in mind to use lower case for the name and the password except for entering the WEP key, and ignore the number of bullets that appear in the window as you type. And be sure to change at least the password, and preferably the name also, to something you can remember.

Hope this helps. Let us know if you have problems.

__________________________________
Justin
Verizon FiOS TV, Internet, and phone
QIP6416-P1, IMG 1.8, Build 02.54
Keller, TX 76248

[Anti-Phish1]

Try logging in with the router's serial number located on the service label under the bar code.

If that doesn't work, instructions for resetting the router to factory defaults can be found here:

I Can't login to the VZ router

[dslr595148]

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@DblSides wrote:

Justin... thanks for the step by step instructions, I'm sure the process will be quite simple.  Now for the not so good news... A verizon tech originally installed my router and honestly I don't know the user name or password.  I have never had any issues or reasons to login to the router until now.  So... that's both good news and bad news all in a nutshell. 

Is there a way to retrieve or reset the info needed??  Please kindly advise.

Thanks again and Happy Holidays to you.

---

Justin beat me to it.

[aseatanner]

My understanding is that revisions G and H of the Actiontec MI424WR router have gigabit ethernet ports, whereas the earlier versions do not.  If I were to be so fortunate to get one of these versions, wouldn't that make my wired network transfer rate much greater to my auxiliary router?  But then I wouldn't need an auxiliary router because both of those are rated as "n" routers.  However, I believe the G version, having only one antenna, is rated for 150 mb max, whereas the H has two antennas and is rated for the full 300 mb wireless rate.