Actiontec MI424WR rev G router and xbox live best settings Quality of Service (QoS)

[XboxGuy]

I have the 150 mbps plan using ethernet and use a wired connection

after playing around with the routers settings for a couple of weeks I was able to drastically improve my connection for xbox live (specifically Black Ops).

1.  set up a static ip address and change the DNS Servers. to do this go to the routers settings website

then go to My Network

then go to Network Connections on the left

then go to Network (Home/Office)

then click settings at the bottom

scroll down to "End IP Adress and change the last number to 200

while you are here go to DNS Server and select No DNS Server

click apply to finalize the change

Next at the Network Connections screen click on Broadband Connection (Ethernet) or (Coax) whichever one says connected

Go to settings 

Scroll down to DNS Servers and select "Use the following DNS server addresses" 

then enter new dns addresses (search online for better numbers to use there is a program called "namebench" that i found usefull for this.

next turn on your xbox and go to network settings and enter a manual ip adress  with the last number being anything above 200 on my xbox the ip address is 192.168.1.201 the first three numbers depend on the routers ip address and will be the same for every device connected to the router. (this will automatically make the router use that ip address and it will never change because the router will never automatically  give out an ip adress with the last number more than 200)

also manually enter the dns addresses that you are using

2.  i recommend setting your xbox as the DMZ Host

just go to firewall settings and click DMZ Host on the left and enter the ip adress of the xbox

Warning: this puts the dmz host outside of the firewall doing this with a computer would be dangerous but i see no reason why someone would hack an xbox, i have never heard of it happening.

3. Next set up port forwarding for xbox live forward (this may be redundant if you set up DMZ but i don't believe it can hurt)

make sure you use the ip adress that you gave to your xbox

3074 UDP and TCP

53 UDP and TCP

80 TCP

88 UDP

4. Set up Quality of Service rules (QoS) (this was the hardest part for me to figure out but can make the biggest difference depending on your plan and the use of your plan.  roommates downloading porn will no longer lag your game

Click Advanced at the top

then click Quality of Service (QoS)

then click traffic shaping on the left

then click Add

Tx Bandwidth: select specify and don't change the numbers

TCP Serialization: Enabled

Maximum Delay: 5 ms

Queue Policy: Class Based

Click add

Name: xbox or whatever you want

Class Priority: 0 (Highest)

Bandwidth: Maximum: Unlimited

Policy: Priority

Rx Traffic Policing 

Rx Bandwidth: Unlimited

click Add

Name: xbox

Bandwidth: Unlimited

click Apply as always then click Apply again untill you can select Traffic Priority on the left menu

On the traffic priority screen

For QoS Input Rules

For Network (Home/Office) Rules click Add

Source Address: Any

Destination Address: your xbox IP address

Protocol: Any

DSCP: Checked then input 2E and leave Mask as 3F

Priority: unchecked

Length: unchecked

Set DSCP: checked then select Specify instead of Automatic and input 2E and leave mask as 3F

Set Priority: unchecked

Set Rx Class Name: Checked and select the Rx class that you created earlier

Set Tx Class Name: checked and select the class you made

Apply Qos on: Connection

Logging: i recommend unchecked i would also suggest turning all logging off

clck apply

Next do the same thing for Qos Output Rules 

except set the Source adress to the xbox Ip address and leave the destination address as any

make sure you click apply enough times until the screen no longer changes or you may lose changes

5. and finally reset the router and the xbox

If you are connecting wirelessly I would recommend clicking Wireless at the top

then Advanced Security Settings on the left

scroll down and click on "802.11b/g/n Mode"

and change the mode to Performance Mode (802.11n) if you have the n wireless adapter and don't have any defices that can't use n mode.

or legacy mode (802.11b/g) if you have the g wireless adapter

if you don't have the n adapter i would recommend getting it

Everything in my apartment supports n so using performance mode makes a differenc if you can use it

and hopefully you will notice a drastic improvement of xbox live play

I am not a network guru or anything so if anyone knows of anyway to improve on this please post it so that others can enjoy a better connection as well.  It helps everyone as playing people with bad connections can degrade your experience as well

[Sixpho]

When you say "reset" the router, you don't mean a complete reset do u? Just a turn off/on?

[Sixpho]

Nevermind, I have Rev F and don't have the same options.

[XboxGuy]

Reset by either unplugging the router, using the on/off switch, or using the router settings page go to advanced at the top then click on reboot router (this can be usefull if you don't want your roommates to know you temporarily interupted their internet service)

[Anti-Phish1]

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@XboxGuy wrote:

Reset by either unplugging the router, using the on/off switch, or using the router settings page go to advanced at the top then click on reboot router (this can be usefull if you don't want your roommates to know you temporarily interupted their internet service)

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Just to clarify terminaology, reseting the router ususally refers to a hard reset of the router, whereas the actions you listed are all ways to reboot the router which does reset it to factory redafults.

[XboxGuy]

I also meant to reboot the xbox (not reset)....don't forget to use common sense, don't paint your fire wood : )

[bigmike80925]

I ran into the same issue were my Xbox and PS3 would no longer stay connected. Here is what I did to fix both issues.

1. First you must set a HOST name on the XBOX/PS3. I could not find any instructions online for the Xbox. but the setting is located in the network settings, under the network settings, under additional settings. For the PS3 here is a link. http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/settings/connectadvance.html

1. After you set a host name on your game system restore your router to defaults. then go to the advanced settings
2. Say yes to the warning
3. Select Universal Plug n play make sure there is a check mark in both of the following boxes
   1. a.     Allow Other Network Users to Control Wireless Broadband Router's Network Features
   2. Enable Automatic Cleanup of Old Unused UPnP Services (what this does it allows the router to delete old unused UPNP rules that the router is no longer using.) Which is causing  the problem or at least I think.
4. Click apply to save your settings.
5. then connect your game system.
6. Verify once the device is connected that it is showing up under the MY network page with the host name that you set on it.
7. Now when the router see's the gaming system it will always use any UPNP rules that are already there instead of making a new rule.

I hope this helps. There is NO reason to DMZ host your device or setup QoS rules that Verizon will not support anyways. These steps work with any hardware version of the MI424WR.

[XboxGuy]

Recently My internet stopped working with these settings and i had to reset to factory defaults

attempted to redo everything and no longer can use the same settings

anyone else have these problems?

I will update when I find my new setup.

[Darn2]

Hey xboxguy,

I saw that you responded to a one of my threads i posted a while back. For a while I had kinda  given up on my quest to find decent latency on FIOS. About a year ago I switched from COAX to ethernet and it made it worse. I tried multiple cables and routers but nothing seems to help. Are you using ethernet or COAX? Im thinking about going back to COAX. Also what is your connection like when you use the default settings on the router? For me its nearly impossible to play all the time like it is for the OP of this thread. When I login at 2am its "better" but still very unplayable. Every once in a while (like 1 day in month) the lag will just go away for no reason, without changing any settings and the next day the lag will come back.

I noticed in your most recent post you said the internet stopped working with your qos settings. Does that mean you have lag again?  I want to test out your settings to see if they'll work for me but wasn't sure if it would matter because we might have different setup problem all together.

[Mziegele]

i have just started to notice the lag over xbox live. This just started up a few days ago- its making playing online unbarable