New blueyonder wireless self-install - no connect - anyone else tried?

Hello all,

Subject gives you the gist: I have just subscribed to blueyonder's new
wireless self-install. £35 gets you a Netgear WAP to plug into the
set-top box and a USB wireless antenna.

Sadly, attempting to connect fails (on two machines). The wireless LAN
seems to be up with no problems and the box can see the WAP. However,
the WAP doesn't seem to be able to connect upstream. As usual, the
supplied installer refuses to tell me anything useful but I can see
that an ipconfig /renew is failing.

The support tool reports that all upstream connection tests have
failed (DNS, mail etc). VArious sequences of reboots achieve nothing
although I notice that although my box is firing packets across to the
WAP, it never receves anything back *except* when I reboot the STB -
then I receive 2 bytes (not quite 'broadband' I think you'll agree).

Since the support centre wait queue is described as over 20 mins I
thought I'd try here..

q's:

- Anyone else tried this new service un/successfully?

- Does it take a while for the MAC to register? I assumed they would
have this recorded somewhere already and have it preconfigured for my
address when they sent it out to me.

- Is it worth phoning the support line at like midnight or is it just
always busy?

Any thoughts gratefully received,
cam

Not a lot to suggest but:

1) You say you can see the WAP. Can you actually do anything on the WAP from
the client (eg open the configuration window in a browser), or do you mean
that you are seeing a wireless association? The reason I ask is that if you
have a wireless connection with the correct SSID (network name) but the
wrong WEP key then you will see an association, and packets will go from you
to the WAP but you will not see any packets being received (because they
can't be decrypted and are therefore being dropped).

2) You assumed they would register the MAC address, but I would check this
if I were you. You can register your own MAC addresses and check your
registrations at the blueyonder self-help website.

Martin

"cam" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed) m...
> Hello all,
>
> Subject gives you the gist: I have just subscribed to blueyonder's new
> wireless self-install. £35 gets you a Netgear WAP to plug into the
> set-top box and a USB wireless antenna.
>
> Sadly, attempting to connect fails (on two machines). The wireless LAN
> seems to be up with no problems and the box can see the WAP. However,
> the WAP doesn't seem to be able to connect upstream. As usual, the
> supplied installer refuses to tell me anything useful but I can see
> that an ipconfig /renew is failing.
>
> The support tool reports that all upstream connection tests have
> failed (DNS, mail etc). VArious sequences of reboots achieve nothing
> although I notice that although my box is firing packets across to the
> WAP, it never receves anything back *except* when I reboot the STB -
> then I receive 2 bytes (not quite 'broadband' I think you'll agree).
>
> Since the support centre wait queue is described as over 20 mins I
> thought I'd try here..
>
> q's:
>
> - Anyone else tried this new service un/successfully?
>
> - Does it take a while for the MAC to register? I assumed they would
> have this recorded somewhere already and have it preconfigured for my
> address when they sent it out to me.
>
> - Is it worth phoning the support line at like midnight or is it just
> always busy?
>
> Any thoughts gratefully received,
> cam

Alex Brown <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message news:<(E-Mail Removed)>...
> cam wrote:
> > Hello all,
>
> I've forwarded your post to one of the support team who should be in touch
> shortly.

Thanks Alex (and other responders)... I managed to get someone at
broadband support tonight who has escalated this. He was pretty
helpful and we spent a nice hour together rebooting various things and
making sure password had been spelled right (! I'm not having a go,
this is a difficult job to do over the phone and these guys must have
the patience of a saint..)

Anyway, he went off and spoke to a senior and they did something to
the line which somehow enabled a lot more packets to flow between the
AP and the antenna. Still no luck with reaching the DHCP server
though...

Martin.. I've just confirmed that a bad WEP passwd still indicates a
valid connection in the systray icon (green) but no packets seem to
flow. A bad ssid however, shows as red (i.e. no connection)

Intestingly (uselessly?) the two indicator lights on both the antenna
and the AP stay lit at all times...

So, I'm to be phoned tomorrow night. Not the fastest turnaround but I
suppose theres a big queue. Being a network developer, I'd love to
know whats going on and how this infrastructure is laid out.. where
are my packets going? (Do let me know if yooz are recruiting Alex...!)

I have a feeling this will all result in a new STB arriving - what
else could be the problem?

As usual, any insight welcome,
cam

"Martin Stockdale" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message news:<bi08ue$e7h$(E-Mail Removed)>...
> The indicator lights being on at both ends is a little strange, but all the
> lights do different things on different peoples kit so you'd need to check
> in the manual to be sure. I think the self-install kit is NetGear so it
> might be worth a visit to their site if the BY documentation is a bit
> sparce.

Yeah, theres not a lot from BY. I got an ME102 AP and an MA101 USB
antenna.

> Hope Tech Support sorts it out for you, keep us posted.

About twenty minutes on the phone tonight going thru various checks
again, reboots etc. and still nothing so the guy kicked it up/across
to the network guys. He phoned back about half an hour later and told
me to try an ipconfig: sorted.

He had no real idea what they had done (hey, they might lose their job
if they just told anyone, even in their own organisation, right?) but
it worked.

Upshot: pretty good turnaround and helpful staff.

Thanks to all responders and (on the evidence of the last half hour of
lightning downloads) I can recommend blueyonder...

cheers,
cam

Glad to hear you got sorted.

Martin

"cam" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed) m...
> "Martin Stockdale" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in
message news:<bi08ue$e7h$(E-Mail Removed)>...
> > The indicator lights being on at both ends is a little strange, but all
the
> > lights do different things on different peoples kit so you'd need to
check
> > in the manual to be sure. I think the self-install kit is NetGear so it
> > might be worth a visit to their site if the BY documentation is a bit
> > sparce.
>
> Yeah, theres not a lot from BY. I got an ME102 AP and an MA101 USB
> antenna.
>
> > Hope Tech Support sorts it out for you, keep us posted.
>
> About twenty minutes on the phone tonight going thru various checks
> again, reboots etc. and still nothing so the guy kicked it up/across
> to the network guys. He phoned back about half an hour later and told
> me to try an ipconfig: sorted.
>
> He had no real idea what they had done (hey, they might lose their job
> if they just told anyone, even in their own organisation, right?) but
> it worked.
>
> Upshot: pretty good turnaround and helpful staff.
>
> Thanks to all responders and (on the evidence of the last half hour of
> lightning downloads) I can recommend blueyonder...
>
> cheers,
> cam