Not so super Virgin Superhub....

RobertP

RobertP

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Yesterday VM came and took away my cable modem and replaced it with a 'superhub'.

The engineer didn't even try to connect to it wirelessly and tested it via wire to the wifi from my existing Linksys WRT56G router on which I'd disabled DHCP whilst he was installing the new 'superhub'. I thought it a bit odd that he said twice he did it because it is probably better - an old wireless G versus a brand new N router.

Everything was working when he left as far as I knew. Both my existing routers are working as access points/Ethernet switches (I have a cheap N router at the back of the house as the signal was weak) instead of one being a router and everything is getting IP addresses from the DHCP on the superhub, so I thought I'd try the wireless on the superhub...

I can't believe how bad it is! Absolutely no device will connect with the default WPA auto encryption. dropping it down to basic 64 bit WEP I can get the ipad to connect and work but laptops either give up or connect with no internet access. A galaxy S2 will not connect either. Tried lots of wireless channels and messed with other settings based on google searches and can only conclude it is rubbish and the engineer knew it.

Anyway the superhub has a modem mode so I'll be enabling that shortly and turning DHCP back on in the Linksys. I might still upgrade the linksys to an N but the superhub is not going to be the upgrade.

Virgins forums are full of similar problems. Shame they insisted my modem had to go as I know it could handle the speed.

end of rant :)
 
Yup... Never had a good box from an ISP (although Clara.net have delivered a nice ZyXcel 4604 which seems to be OK).

My biggest worry (I'm going on FTTC at 60/20 on Tuesday - yay - go me!) is getting a router that is fast enough to deal with properly firewalling something that speed. I wasn't convinced, so built one.

Now to find an uber performant dual-band N access point.
 
arad85 said:
Yup... Never had a good box from an ISP (although Clara.net have delivered a nice ZyXcel 4604 which seems to be OK).

My biggest worry (I'm going on FTTC at 60/20 on Tuesday - yay - go me!) is getting a router that is fast enough to deal with properly firewalling something that speed. I wasn't convinced, so built one.

Now to find an uber performant dual-band N access point.
Click to expand...

iknow what you mean, we use an off the shelf hardware firewall/vpn device at remote sites. theyre quite aging and fall over on a connection over 24mb adsl.

without wanting to go to far off topic, ive seen you mention a DIY device previously andy.. more info?
 
neil_g said:
without wanting to go to far off topic, ive seen you mention a DIY device previously andy.. more info?
Click to expand...

One of these: http://www.lambda-tek.com/componentshop/index.pl?prodID=2336275 with an extra Intel NIC, 2G of DDR3-SODIMM and an mSATA disk running this: http://www.pfsense.org/ Total cost £192 inc case and delivery. Runs totally passively and off an old laptop supply too.

Very impressed so far. I'm even starting to block stuff at the gateway rather than at machines. I also have IPS/IDS running and getting very light CPU loads (2%) on a 4M down/1M up connection. No wireless, but I'll let the old router deal with that.

Yes, I know it's £192 on a firewall, but it has a boatload of processing available, is extensible and can grow with my internet connection over time...

If you go for a pfsense box, the Intel NICs are recommended.
 
I'm using a Draytek 2820 on My by infinity (using by modem) and it copes fine with 40mbit
 
arad85 said:
One of these: http://www.lambda-tek.com/componentshop/index.pl?prodID=2336275 with an extra Intel NIC, 2G of DDR3-SODIMM and an mSATA disk running this: http://www.pfsense.org/ Total cost £192 inc case and delivery. Runs totally passively and off an old laptop supply too.

Very impressed so far. I'm even starting to block stuff at the gateway rather than at machines. I also have IPS/IDS running and getting very light CPU loads (2%) on a 4M down/1M up connection. No wireless, but I'll let the old router deal with that.

Yes, I know it's £192 on a firewall, but it has a boatload of processing available, is extensible and can grow with my internet connection over time...

If you go for a pfsense box, the Intel NICs are recommended.
Click to expand...

ta for the info. to be honest £192 isnt a lot for a decent hardware firewall, especially like you say with that much poke.
 
Dale_d3100 said:
I'm using a Draytek 2820 on My by infinity (using by modem) and it copes fine with 40mbit
Click to expand...
I looked at both Draytek and ZyXel and they were both about £40-£50 more expensive and were far less powerful/configurable. As I said, I'm running extra packages on the firewall here: snort for intrusion detection and pfBlocker to block IP addresses of known compromised systems/hackers as well as ad blocking. I'm thinking of running a web content filter too...
 
Virgin 'Super-Hub' works fine here - laptop, iPad and iPhone all connect with really good speed on the 50MB network, also have 2 x desktop PC's connected by 'Powerline' via the mains.

I had a similar 'wired-only' installation by the Virgin 'engineer', who informed me that their job was to ensure that the hub was receiving from Virgin and could connect via ethernet BUT that they were not responsible for setting up/checking the customer network.

If required, Virgin will send you a USB dongle for your PC/Laptop.
 
I've got a feeling it doesn't cope too well with other wireless devices in the area. I see around 10 - 15 networks on the laptop including mine.

The router I've been looking at to replace the linksys is the ASUS RT-N56U which is also a NAS/media server if you plug a USB hard drive or pen drive in. About £85 at amazon
 
I'd probably try changing the channel on the superhub first to a less used one to see if that helps reliability. If you can see 10 to 15 other wireless networks that is a lot!
 
You may find the dual band helps - if you have any devices that can also see the 5GHz band, that may be less congested. My dual band AP has a stronger signal in the 2.4GHz band though....
 
Have you tried 'seeing' which channels nearby networks are using?
There are a number of free downloads available to identify these.
 
Having tried about 6 different channels manually and auto select on the superhub I don't think its worth the effort in trying more :)
 
srichards said:
I'd probably try changing the channel on the superhub first to a less used one to see if that helps reliability. If you can see 10 to 15 other wireless networks that is a lot!
Click to expand...

Just check - 17 networks to choose from. 2 with no security for when Virgin breaks :)
 
Wish I read this last week, got a new super hub coming tomorrow. Self install though.
I thought it was about time I upgraded my old surfboard SB4100 modem. Hopefully if its self install they wont take it away, well they wont as my wife is answering the door and there is no chance some delivery man is messing with my network.
I has a similar problem when I upgraded to a cheap Belkin N class router and my laptop would only connect at 54Mbs until I set the security to WPA2-PSK.
We will see what happens tomorrow...
 
I've had issues with my Superhub but it's down to the devices trying to connect rather than the Superhub............some do some dont. HTC phone didn't connect but Sony tv, Iphone etc all connected.

I lowered the security settings and the HTC connected.

It has a fantastic range!
 
I'm the same it works okay wired but I set it up wire to main pc, wireless to my pc and mac mini in the loft wireless to the iPhone iPods and tablets and laptops, not one could actually connect. The old modem gave us the same speed so I'm tempted to go back to it as we often need to reset the modem to regain access to the web. Not impressed at all!

The random dropouts are really irritating as I use the pc in the loft for gaming and study so when it drops out its either interrupting a game or research and studying and I've to go downstairs switch off, switch on, check the we have access to the web on the pc that's wired to the modem and go back up and resume, derailing my train of thought or worse(!) putting wrecking my flow in games!
 
robinchun said:
Had my Super Hub for getting on a year now and no probs..in fact it's great!!

Robin
Click to expand...

Do you see 16 other wireless networks when connecting? I still think it cannot cope with other signals around. If you are in a quiet area then it may well be great.
 
I've been having issues for ages with mine. They have replaced it once as it kept resetting itself every 5 minutes and loosing all settings.
The new one arrived, and nothing would connect wirelessly, which is what I wanted it for.

VM advertise heavily the wireless capability of the super hub, with only a tiny footnote mentioning wired connectivity.
When I questioned VM about this, they just said they cant guarantee wireless connections.

I've since stuck it in modem mode and I'm using my old belkin router, and so far it's not been too bad.
 
Got mine today and it works ok. The signal strength to my laptop is no better than my cheap old Belkin router. I cant get my wireless printer to connect whatever I try :(
Tried setting all the security settings in the printer via a wired connection to the router so they match the pooperhub but they just wont talk.
My speeds have gone thru the roof though, I was getting about 12Mb download and less than 1 upload. Now I am seeing 40-48Mb download and 2.5-3Mb uploads.

Edit.
Got the printer working, had to manually set the er, settings, with it wired to the router matched up the SSID, authentication method, password etc and now it works fine.
Next challenge is to move the hub downstairs as my computer room has to be given up for incoming spawn. Virgin want £99 to plug a 2 way splitter in the living room so I am gonna do it myself for under a fiver from e-bay. I may not let you know if I break it, as I wont be able to get on-line any more ;-)
Oh and I managed to get 62Mbps on a speedtest thru thinkbroadband :-)
 
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