New Member
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6 Messages
BGW320-500 dropped connections and power cycling
A few months ago, I signed up for AT&Ts Internet 5000 plan. Fiber had just been completed a few months before that in my neighborhood. Unfortunately, I have since had about 70 outages ranging from a few minutes to weeks. Each time the modem would restart and go into a cycle of a single amber flash of light, a slow flashing white light, fast flashing white light, then repeat. Following the usual troubleshooting steps failed to resolve the issue, such as unplugging the modem, waiting, replugging, etc. I spoke to many techs on the phone, had no less than 7 techs come out to check everything locally, a teams call with a tech at my home and several high level folks on the other end. None were able to determine the issue or get it cleared up. One modem was packed up and sent to R&D or wherever those go. Finally, after dropping back to an older 1gig modem it cleared up, but that is not the service I needed or wanted, so after AT&T tried wiping my account completely, and establishing a new account, the problem went away for weeks. I was excited. But now its back.
My setup is fiber->BGW320-500 with all wifi antennas turned off, ->10gb Switch*->Orbi RBRE960 and 2 Satellites->Smart Home w/about 42 devices (Ring Alarm system, assorted devices like lights, switches, plugs, etc.). My LAN is Cat8 and Cat6 runs, and 10GB ethernet cards in my work PC.
* Completely removing my local network does not change the behavior of the modem.
The last 2-3 times I called in, the results are the same. They troubleshoot with me, the system may come back online while we're talking, right after we talk, or sometime between then and the tech being dispatched. Regardless, the techs have been no shows without even notifying me they are not coming. I honestly think they've given up on it being a local issue, but I call or text would be nice considering I alter my schedule for them. I usually get a text about the scheduled tech, the COVID warning text, and a couple of times one that says something like "we found and fixed an issue on our end and it looks like your internet is not back online, please respond "FIXED" if you wish to close the request" (or something like that), which I have not be doing. If may come back up, but not for long.
I have tried everything I can think of next to cancelling my account or settling for a slower product. Neither is something I want to do. I've invested too much time and money into this so far. Upgrading to 10gbit network hardware, Wifi6e mesh, and pure sine wave UPS just to mention a few of the investments. (And yes, I did remove the UPS and any power strips from the modem, which is completely counterintuitive if you ask me, and risky).
In defense of the techs that have come out to help, they have been competent and professional, and have tracked every facet of the hardware install inside my house, outside my house, and to the local switches/splitters. They've replace my modem FIVE times. They replaced the inside wiring, connectors, etc. With the intermittent nature of the problem, they basically throw everything they can at it until it comes back up. A few days may go by, then the process begins again. They've been as flummoxed as I.
I am not ready to let this thing beat me. Any ideas would be great. Is there a log I can access in the modem to get a record of my downtime? I use my own local network logs and can see indicators of when it does down. (Not to mention an orbi satellite in my room to loves to start flashing when it loses connection, and its plenty bright and wakes me up when it does.). Also, if there some known issue related to the number of devices connecting to the network? Some reps seem surprised at the number of devices connecting.
I tried to keep this short, but its been a long three months. I even had to switch to my hot-spot to complete this post, my internet went down again while I was typing.
I'd love to get other suggestions, and I am happy to answer any of your questions that I can.
ATTHelp
Community Support
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214.9K Messages
1 year ago
We apologize for the inconvenience and we're here to help with your internet, @fiberuptick.
Baes on the information you provided, we will need to bring you into direct message to further assist you.
In the mean time, you can use our troubleshoot and resolve tool to find issues with your network and follow steps to resolve them.
Please check your Direct Message Inbox (it’s the chat icon next to the bell icon in the upper right corner of the Forums).
Elmi, AT&T Community Specialist.
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browndk26
ACE - Professor
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5K Messages
1 year ago
Did the techs ever swap out the sfp connector that plugs into the gateway? Switch to the other bgw320 manufacturer?
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fiberuptick
New Member
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6 Messages
1 year ago
@browndk26 Yes, they replaced they SFP, as well as the gateway itself 5 or 6 times now. I am unaware of another manufacturer of the gateway, so I couldn't say if it has been changed. They all looked the same to me.
A tech finally showed up yesterday and didn't stay long at all. Seems my issue is the one nobody wants to deal with. I am rescheduled for Tuesday (in 3 days) where they are going to try another group call or something. I am back on my hotspot today. Still cycling. I'm up to 110 times since the February install.
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fiberuptick
New Member
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6 Messages
1 year ago
@ATTHelp I followed your link and got this:
"Alert!
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fiberuptick
New Member
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6 Messages
1 year ago
Quick update, I visited the support link. The link worked today. The troubleshooting steps were the same. Still coming up and down. Thanks for the link.
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fiberuptick
New Member
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6 Messages
1 year ago
So it has been about 2 weeks and I have only had a few short outages. While not perfect, it is a good step in the right direction. It stabilized for a couple days before the tech arrived. He spoke to someone on the phone but did not make changes locally. Aside from that I wish I could say what was done by AT&T, but there was a tech assigned to work from somewhere upstream and not at my home. I was not provided any feedback whatsoever once the on-site tech left.
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t6413
New Member
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3 Messages
1 year ago
I recently upgraded from 1GB Fiber to 2GB fiber two days ago, the upgrade came with a new BGW320-500, where the fiber goes directly into the gateway.
I'm experiencing the same issue as listed here on this thread with multiple reboot cycles, that eventually end in the red light, and require a power cycle to restore service.
With the previous 1GB service and gateway there was never any issue. I run a similar setup with atleast 80+ devices connecting, using a 10gb switch on the backend, with eero Pro 6e's on hardwired back.
I've contacted AT&T and they're sending a new gateway out. I'm skeptical that will resolve the issue. If this was finally fixed for you please let me know what the resolutions was.
Many thanks in advance!
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fiberdownagain
New Member
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1 Message
11 months ago
A long time AT&T customer. I recently had the old-school copper slow speed upgraded to fiber with the BG320 by Nokia. After installation I worked for a couple of days. Then it was down for three days. No Internet, no TV, no web browsing. ATT send a tech who did not show up in the timeframe provided but was courteous enough to come about an hour and 15 minutes after the time. he kindly explained that he was upgrading another customer and took longer than expected. Once he was done at my place in this past Saturday around 6:30pm. Today Tuesday, the Internet went down. Usual steps of unplug and replug power. Reset. Head flashing green light. Help app said to schedule a tech and says tech will come tomorrow. It’s sounds very much like the issue above. I’m having regrets about upgrading speed. The old slow gateway hardly ever went down. This new one has been down multiple times, I read above that fiberuptick had techs come by 7 times. I’m not hopeful. Is it the gateway or is it the fiber service?
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t6413
New Member
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3 Messages
11 months ago
I eventually solved this issue, after much trial and error with ATT. They shipped out a new router, which after connecting and setting up I was experiencing issues with.
Long story short, I soon realized it wasn't either router. It was the Fiber GBIC that was bad. When I swapped the "defective" router for the new one, I used all the same cables i.e. the power adapter, the fiber cable, and the GBIC which of course led to the same issues. Once I swapped out the GBIC it's been solid ever since.
I hope maybe this advice is helpful and that you're able to solve your issue soon!
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fiberuptick
New Member
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6 Messages
11 months ago
My issue seems to have resolved itself, and I can only speculate as the causes. It seems likely that the high number of devices I had connecting to my switch, and the way in which it was connected to the gateway may have had something to do with it.
I have found that the issue could be recreated by restarting the gateway with the gateway in IP passthrough mode, connected to an Orbi mesh router, and the Orbi connected to a high speed switch (10bgbit). With around 50 devices (security system with proximity switches, motion detectors, cameras, etc) connected, the gateway would start failing the handshaking part of start up and begin power cycling.
I've had luck shutting down and restarting at the gateway first, ensuring successful startup, and then moving on to the router and switch. While this had been tried in the past, it seemed to work this time. I am not sure what may have been changed or updated on the head end, but it seems to be running ok for now.
Perhaps AT&T did something to help, but they did not communicate what, if anything, it was they did. I'll keep checking in here if anything changes, but for now I am up and running, just with lower confidence.
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