Both Tivo's have amnesia

[HerMrFixit]

The appalling WiFi coverage of the onboard Virgin Media Broadband modem and the complaints from family about the low signal strength and poor coverage had me resort to placing the unit into Modem Mode and disabling the onboard WiFi and replacing this element with a proper Wifi router. 

Smashing!   Lovely strong WiFi all over the the house and even out into the garden. 🙂

But wait,  The two STB's also need a connection, so I dutifully provide them with the details and all is lovely and everybody is happy.

Until...  The STB's both forget that they are to connect to the WiFi network and so all the customisable user recording lists and requests etc. disappear and domestic unhappiness ensues.

Go into setting and tell the STB's to connect to Virgin Media and they complain that the network cable is unplugged.  "But Mr. STB we are using WiFI, just like you did on the in-built wifi of the broadband modem and you never forgot those details, did you?  So why are you always forgetting to connect on the new WiFI?"  Tell it to look for WiFi networks and re-connect to the Wifi router(it still has the password lodged in its memory so it clearly has all the details it needs/needed.

Bingo!  everything works again.  🙂

But this is an everyday occurrence.  😞

No other device using the non-Virgin Wifi network has any issue staying connected, remembering to connect etc. etc.   Just these awful Virgin STB's.   They have the settings, they just decide not to connect automatically.  Utter Rubbish!

So fed up with this I am thinking of switching supplier.  😞

[japitts]

---

@HerMrFixit wrote:

When the V6 is reporting a 169.x.x.x address the WiFi router admin is contactable on its normal 192.168.1.1 address, and reports numerous connected devices (all of which are working just fine and are in  the 192.168.1.xxx range) .   The router's DHCP function is set to support an address range from 192.168.1.100 ...254.

---

Let's clarify what my question was, it may just help us find a solution here.

Within your router, each connected device should be listed with its allocated IP address - this should be the same as reported by the individual device. Almost irrespective of what the address is, is that it's the same at both ends.

So does your router report the V6 connected on the same IP as the V6 reports? I don't think you're going to resolve this issue until it is.

[Roger_Gooner]

The V6 showing the 169.254.163.46 IP address is not getting an address from the DHCP server. We need to go back to your first post: "... resort to placing the unit into Modem Mode and disabling the onboard WiFi and replacing this element with a proper Wifi router". You don't do anything to disable WiFi when the hub is put into modem mode as this is done automatically, so did you just disable the WiFi? If so the hub is still in router mode, meaning that there are two DHCP servers running. I suggest one of two oprions:

1. Put your router aside, enable the hub's WiFi and your V6s will get their IP addresses from the hub.

2. Put your hub into modem mode, reboot your router to get it working (needs to pick up its new WAN IP address) and your V6s will get their IP addresses from the router.

[japitts]

Good spot Roger.

Edited to recommend @HerMrFixit reads Roger's post with post-18.

[Ernie_C]

…but the OP is adamant he is in Modem Mode.

[Roger_Gooner]

It may be helpful to say how to put a hub into modem mode. VM has a page on how to do it but doesn't say that the hub 3's LED changes to magenta and that the router needs to be connected by its WAN port and usually needs to be rebooted to get its WAN IP address.

[HerMrFixit]

Sorry if I wasn't clear.

Yes, I followed the online guide in doing this switch to "Modem Mode".

The Cable Modem is in Modem mode and the tell-tale light is magenta. 

I understood from the "how-to" guide that this only happened when you had correctly set "Modem Mode" and the on-board WiFi was then disabled.

Is this NOT true?

Yes my new Tenda WiFi router IS connected to the Cable Modem by its WAN port.

My "cabled" devices are then connected to the other ethernet ports on the TENDA router and all of my wireless devices are connected to the  SSID of the WiFi router.

Only the V6 boxes appear to be having a problem in reconnecting to the VM service on their periodic schedule as they fail to get a valid IP address even though they have been configured to connect to the same SSID of the Tenda Router's WiFi network and they certainly know the password as I never have to re-enter it when I "manually" force the V6 box to reconnect.

I would contend that it cannot be the Tenda WiFi router that is failing as I can see its admin pages when connecting on the standard 192.168....   admin address and ALL other Wifi connected devices are getting and using the WifI network each time with no issues in obtaining an IP address from the Tenda Router and  full internet access is enjoyed; there are plenty  of addresses still available.

[japitts]

In which case, I can only repeat a couple of the questions previously posed but not yet answered.

1: Does the IP address on the V6 network connections screen, tally with what's displayed in your router for the V6?

2: If you temporarily revert your Superhub into router mode and connect the V6 directly, does all behave as expected?

[HerMrFixit]

1. When everything is working the IP Address the V6 says it is using on my WiFi network is the same as the address the WiFi Admin pages show is being used by device (Tivo6800).

2. I can revert the hub to router mode of course, but do you mean connect the V6 directly by cable, or directly to the native W-Fi of the Hub (I suspect you mean the latter)?

Cheers for the help.

[Roger_Gooner]

Typically one of a customer's V6s is close to the hub or router, so always use an Ethernet cable for connection.

[Ernie_C]

Trying to connect the V6 to WiFi on the Hub in Router mode would potentially identify if the V6 is at fault by suffering the fault on a second router DHCP server.