Netduma R2 Persistent Instability

[TheVisualFeast]

I can't remember a time when I didn't have problems with this router. From exceptionally poor WiFi, to ad blocking that prevents people using the web, to dropping WAN connectivity, this router and DumaOS in general just seems unfinished and not ready for public distribution.

The latest reoccurring issue, complete loss of connectivity and management to router. Has happened on three separate occasions over the last few months since 205, all requiring a factory reset. I would love to provide you with the logs, but accessing the GUI after power cycling the router triggers the issue. All I can do is leave it, which will buy some time before something else triggers the same issue and I need to factory reset anyway.  

I've been biting my tongue on posting and hoping things will get better. Looking at these forums, the issues seem common and unrelenting. Nothing else I've ever tinkered with has required so much constant attention and monitoring.

Amongst other things, we were sold on regular updates compared to the other models (is it 2 updates in nearly 9 months?). It's just not good enough.

I'm starting to think that R2/DumaOS is the Cyberpunk of routers.

This is not a dig at the staff on this site who help tremendously, in a clearly terrible environment.

This really isn't good enough.

[Netduma Fraser]

Sorry to hear you're having these issues. What is your exact physical setup - are you using a pure modem (no wifi) or a modem/router (wifi) with the R2? 

What sites specifically get dropped when using Adblocker? We are working with some users directly regarding the disconnects and collecting really helpful information, it appears to be a hard issue to nail but we're getting closer all the time

[TheVisualFeast]

Virgin hub in modem mode is my setup. DHCP presentation to the router.

 

I don't really care about the ad blocking, just a sold feature by yourselves that doesn't work, I've turned it off. I can even forgive the occasional WAN disconnect (although really annoying).

 

The crux of my frustration and the straw that broke the camels back is the constant crashing, both random and UI triggered, resulting in a factory reset to bring it back to life.  

[Netduma Fraser]

I have Virgin as well and I find the modem mode to be a bit finicky, and for this issue it would be better to put the VM Hub in router mode so it can assign a local address to the R2. Once you've done this reserve the IP address it gives the R2 on the hub. Then reboot the R2 from the interface and it should improve from there. 

 

[TheVisualFeast]

Hi Fraser,

hhmm, not sure it's the Virgin equipment that's the problem.

Let me take a step back. I'm actually writing this thread due to the crashes and constant factory resets, not the loss of WAN connectivity, or ad blocking, or crap WiFi.

The R2 is currently losing all routing, switching and management periodically, which doesn't seem to have any relation to the Virgin Hub in my book. 

The R2 WAN port could be plugged directly into a banana, I would still expect management from the other interfaces. I would also not expect management access via the UI to trigger these crashes

 

[Netduma Fraser]

I'm not saying the hub is the issue but rather the R2 may not be establishing the connection after a lease change so doing what I mentioned should resolve that. 

Does there seem to be any patterns or specific behavior on the network prior to the GUI crashing? E.g. high bandwidth usage

[TheVisualFeast]

No unfortunately not, it's not particularly load heavy (so far as I can tell).

What's really holding this back (and the R2 generally for issues) is a lack of log persistence or even some syslog functionality where we could pump them somewhere else.

At the moment I don't make any additional customisations of configuration on the because I know I'm going to have to factory reset it again in a few weeks.

I never had any of these problems with the R1 (exact same setup)

[Netduma Liam]

OK thanks, how many devices approximately are connected to the R2? Are you able to give us a rough idea of what kind of devices these are?

How often are you seeing the disconnects, every few weeks?

Logs can be seen in System Information and are stored on volatile storage so they're cleared when power is lost, I can appreciate why that's not particularly useful in this scenario. One of the things we're working on with some users directly is capturing these logs right up until a crash occurs, this is so far giving us a lot of useful information.

[TheVisualFeast]

I would say around max 10-15 devices at it's max. They consist of a few desktops, laptops, Amazon FireTV's, digital radios, two games consoles, two TVs, two wireless access points, an AV receiver.

Mostly cabled but some WiFi. The R2 does not handle the WiFi and is instead an uplink for two unmanaged switches

It's happened three times since the 205 upgrade and not before.

[Netduma Fraser]

If it didn't happen on .179 it may be best if you downgrade to that to have some stability and wait for a new update

[TheVisualFeast]

So is the new update going to fix this issue? What's the root cause?

[Netduma Fraser]

46 minutes ago, TheVisualFeast said:

So is the new update going to fix this issue? What's the root cause?

Well we are investigating with some users who have similar issues and collecting logs so I don't know what the cause is at the moment but yes it's likely we'll be able to fix it for the next version assuming we can figure out why it is happening

[TheVisualFeast]

Afraid it's reoccurred, completely unresponsive.

I've downgraded to 179 and performed a factory reset.

I look forward to the day the R2/DumaOS is out of beta, I really do.

Maybe through those "frequent updates" we were sold in the marketing?

[Netduma Fraser]

In DHCP Settings, reduce the pool amount, then reserve IPs for your devices with IPs outside the pool. So for example:

Default Pool : 192.168.77.2 - 192.168.77.254
Changed Pool : 192.168.77.20 - 192.168.77.254

Reserved IPs:

77.2, 77.3, 77.4 etc

then reboot the R2 from the interface and see if that works please.

[TheVisualFeast]

Thanks Fraser. Afraid I've already downgraded and don't really have an appetite to re upgrade it if it's so unstable. If I have any problems with .179 I'll upgrade and try it.

It's a shame that DHCP has been a persistent service effecting feature since the R2 release (also remember having to adjust the lease time in .179 to prevent WAN disconnections).

Can you tell me when you're fixing this?

[Netduma Liam]

4 hours ago, TheVisualFeast said:

Thanks Fraser. Afraid I've already downgraded and don't really have an appetite to re upgrade it if it's so unstable. If I have any problems with .179 I'll upgrade and try it.

It's a shame that DHCP has been a persistent service effecting feature since the R2 release (also remember having to adjust the lease time in .179 to prevent WAN disconnections).

Can you tell me when you're fixing this?

We're constantly working on this particular issue and have actually developed new internal tools to help us troubleshoot it. Unfortunately we don't have an ETA as to when we'll be able to fix it, but it's taking high priority currently!

[TheVisualFeast]

Oof, this has started happening on .179 now.

I've upgraded back to .205, performed a factory reset and applied your recommendations. Will let you know how it turns out.

Thanks,