Hub 3 and BT Whole Home Wifi Premium - 2 questions

[MECoker]

Hi,

I have the issue with drop-out using the BT Premium Whole Home Wifi discs (PWHW). I have been through the forums and made the changes I could find but still have the same issues. I wonder if you could advise me?

I have firmware version 9.1.1912.302 on my Hub 3 and version SGAB205018 on my PWHW with "Early adopter" enabled. I have three PWHW discs. Disc one is connected to Port 1 of my Hub 3. Then a cable out of port 2 of Disc 1 and into a switch which feeds:
a) port 1 of disc 2 &
b) another switch to port 1 of disc 3.
This first 8 port switch also has other devices connected to it by ethernet e.g. HP printer and my Microsoft Surface Pro via a Surface Pro docking hub.

The connection is OK some of the time but it randomly drops out. Sometimes several times an hour and it won't connect again for half an hour. I have tried rebooting each device in order (Hub 3, disc 1, disc 2, Disc 3) with enough time in-between for each to properly boot up. I have also tried resetting each device.

I had a Virgin engineer here on Tuesday who swapped my Hub 3 for a new one and checked all my cabling to the Hub 3 so I am assuming that's all OK.

Q1 - One thing I have noticed is that I can only ever get two discs to connect via ethernet despite all three having ethernet cables connected. Is this how it should be?

Q2 - Is it OK to connect through a switch with other devices connected to it or should I have a dedicated switch just for the PWHW devices and feed off port 2 of the last disc in the chain to a switch for everything else? Or, do I need to cable directly into port 1 and out of port 2 of each PWHW disc instead of going through switches?

Also to mention, I have turned off wifi on my Hub 3 but I have not put it into Modem mode as I need to connect my WD MyCloud directly to one of the ports on the Hub 3 (not through a switch) and Modem mode only allows the use of Port 1.

Like many others, I have spent an inordinate amount of time on the phone to Virgin and be passed around and cut off after waiting an hour each time (4 hours in total) for someone to pick up my calls. I have been through the "Gadget Rescue" phone line who wanted to charge me for third party device support even though I told them I just needed the firmware update for the Hub 3. They tried to transfer me to 2nd tier specialist support but I got cut off (again!!!). So, I have now come here for help.

Thanks,
Michael

[MECoker]

Thanks again John. I can send them back.

Can you suggest a good alternative? I looked at the Linksys Velop systems as per other posts on this forum. The price range doesn't allow for AX tech so maybe I should just go for something like AC3900 as I probably don't really need AX but was just trying to futureproof with the premium BT discs.

Michael

[sophist · Accepted solution]

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@MECoker wrote:

Hi,

I have the issue with drop-out using the BT Premium Whole Home Wifi discs (PWHW). I have been through the forums and made the changes I could find but still have the same issues. I wonder if you could advise me?

I have firmware version 9.1.1912.302 on my Hub 3 and version SGAB205018 on my PWHW with "Early adopter" enabled. I have three PWHW discs. Disc one is connected to Port 1 of my Hub 3. Then a cable out of port 2 of Disc 1 and into a switch which feeds:
a) port 1 of disc 2 &
b) another switch to port 1 of disc 3.
This first 8 port switch also has other devices connected to it by ethernet e.g. HP printer and my Microsoft Surface Pro via a Surface Pro docking hub.

The connection is OK some of the time but it randomly drops out. Sometimes several times an hour and it won't connect again for half an hour. I have tried rebooting each device in order (Hub 3, disc 1, disc 2, Disc 3) with enough time in-between for each to properly boot up. I have also tried resetting each device.

I had a Virgin engineer here on Tuesday who swapped my Hub 3 for a new one and checked all my cabling to the Hub 3 so I am assuming that's all OK.

Q1 - One thing I have noticed is that I can only ever get two discs to connect via ethernet despite all three having ethernet cables connected. Is this how it should be?

Q2 - Is it OK to connect through a switch with other devices connected to it or should I have a dedicated switch just for the PWHW devices and feed off port 2 of the last disc in the chain to a switch for everything else? Or, do I need to cable directly into port 1 and out of port 2 of each PWHW disc instead of going through switches?

Like many others, I have spent an inordinate amount of time on the phone to Virgin and be passed around and cut off after waiting an hour each time (4 hours in total) for someone to pick up my calls. I have been through the "Gadget Rescue" phone line who wanted to charge me for third party device support even though I told them I just needed the firmware update for the Hub 3. They tried to transfer me to 2nd tier specialist support but I got cut off (again!!!). So, I have now come here for help.

Thanks,
Michael

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regarding your setup, it sounds correct with The secondary and tertiary discs being fed by the 2nd port on the primary. So based on your description, that’s all good.

Q1 - no, it should be possible to have them all connected via ethernet. 

Q2 - it should be absolutely fine to connect via a switch that has other stuff connected to it. Should make zero difference and the fact that they are unmanaged switches means that it should be 100% down to the BT discs to sort out the network topology, so kinda feels like they’re struggling to do that.. 

not sure that VM can help you with any of this and you may get more help contacting the by whole home WiFi help desk... 

[jbrennand]

If they were the ~£300 ones - you will be able to get a very good triband Mesh sytem for that. See the TPLink DecoM9's - or their X range (x20) that do have AX built in -  also Linksys Velop's, Netgear Orbi's - all are well regarded on here without the AX - or a good AX router from Asus with mesh capability you can add to.

[MECoker]

Thanks for that. it helps me rule out a few things. I've posted my questions on the BT forum now too as suggested.

[MECoker]

Solved! - (Sort of).

After much experimentation and research, my PWHW system has now been working for 16 hours without drop-out. What seems to have made it work is not connecting disc 2 via ethernet. This configuration means I have "Excellent" connections on all 3 discs with the first and furthest discs connected (and recognised) on ethernet and disc 2 on wifi.

I will be asking BT why disc 2 causes havoc when connected by ethernet as I'm sure that's not how it should be as advised by Tehwolf (thanks!).

Thanks everyone for your help.

[MECoker]

My system has been stable for 17 days now and I have been liaising with BT 2nd tier tech who have just advised:

"We have been asked to look into the issue you are having with one of your BT Premium Whole Home Wifi discs showing an amber LED when connected to another disc via Ethernet.

The disc will show an amber LED when the wifi signal between the two discs is Poor, but as you have an Ethernet connection this should over-ride the wifi connection, but it appears that this is not happening.

We are aware of an issue with the current version of firmware and are hoping to release a fix for this in our next version of firmware.  As yet we do not have a definitive date for that release but we will announce it and make it available as soon as we can.

The Whole Home Wi-Fi Premium is mesh device designed to connect disc to disc via Wi-Fi to extend coverage around the home. To align with our other Mesh products we are working hard to introduce a feature to allow multiple discs to be able to connect to the router by Ethernet. As part of this change we will also address cases when discs do not automatically switch to Ethernet when a cable is plugged between discs. Although this feature has not yet been launched it is worth noting that you can still connect your client devices via Ethernet cable using either of the 2 x 1 GB ports that each disc has.

This new feature is currently under development and BT are expecting its launch in a few months’ time."

[The_Storm]

Has your BT Mesh system been stable?

btw I wanted to ask did you make any config changes to your VM Hub?

[MECoker]

It's nearly a year since I posted that last message so I can't remember any config changes I made back in January. The system is stable. I moved one of my discs to a better position as it still relies on WIfi even though it is connected via ethernet. There may be an update I could do to make the ethernet work now but I haven't looked into it as it works OK (not perfect but good enough).

Hope this helps.

[jpeg1]

Not sure that I understand the problem entirely or if this is relevant but I have two of my BT disks (five in total to provide very wide coverage) connected to the router by ethernet.  This has been running satisfactorily for three years. 

[MECoker]

Yes, it depends on the specific configuration. I have my 3 discs daisy-chained through an 8 port unmanaged switch. If I connect them directly to the router they will work OK but I can't do that, hence the need to connect them to each other via the switch using their IN/OUT RJ45 sockets but this isn't/wasn't supported by the firmware. It may be now but I haven't checked the upgrade and tested it.