Help - Vista keeps restarting my router

[Paul Boy]

hi, I've just purchased a new Dell PC with Vista Ultimate for my office, with office 2007 i have a small network of 3 PC's and a Small Business Server 2003 RC2.

Now, everything sorta works well, until i turn on "network Discovery", this causes my ADSL Belkin router to restart immediately, same if i turn on file sharing and printers etc.

The router is now very unstable, and will restarts many many times during the day, each this happens i have to run the connect to the Internet wizard in windows server 2003, and remote access wizard so that everyone has access to exchange etc (email is pushed to mobile devices as well, and the server holds the MX records)

i have spoken with Dell and they have never heard about it, reset the PC to factory defaults
i have updated the Firmware on the router
i have taken the PC home, and it restarts the Belkin router there as well
i have switched off TCP/IPv6
i have talked to belkin, they say there is no problem with any of there routers and they all work with Vista
Vista is up to date


Then today i find this thread (cant post it, hang on and i'll be back with it (5 posts later) Weird one - Router Death by Vista - MSDN Forums

Now i do have uPnP switched on in my Router, this allows very set up of the windows server (the wizard does it all for me)

Do you guys know how to get over this? if it means i have to buy a new ASDL router then so be it.

[Paul Boy]

post 5

this also happens as soon as i try to map a network drive, bang the router restarts, this is so annoying

also if i connect my old XP machine back in, everthing is back to normal and workd fine

i also have a Fixed IP

[Splash]

I'd be looking at a new router, especially if I were hosting email etc behind it. I'm running a Vigor 2800 and it's stonking (My parents and a couple of other people I know run the Belkin wireless routers and they're hardly the most stable or configurable pieces of kit.)

That said... I *did* have odd router behaviour with Vista RC1. I fixed it by turning off IPv6, but this hasn't been necessary with the RTM release.

[Paul Boy]

Thanks, i have worked out that if i turn off uPnP it worked fine revert back to it and vista does indeed reboot it if i map a network drive, or switch on network discovery

now I'm no IT Tech so i need a ADSL router that's very easy to config, and won't cause me problems connecting my windows server 2003 to it, and of course client PC's to the server.

Belkin has a uPnP which allows connectivity of the server (does it all for me) i use BT Business broadband with fixed IP address, in my frustrations i connected the ADSL router supplied by them, got Internet fine, but couldn't get my server to connect, after 3 hours or so, went back to the belkin

is the ADSL router (Vigor 2800) which I've never heard of before easy to config, and does it have uPnP?


Thanks in advance

[Splash]

The Vigor is a solid bit of kit, used by many small businesses. I'd suggest you have a search for "draytek" (the manufacturers) to see if it sounds like your kind of thing. They have lots of enhanced features (VPN support, lots of filtering and reporting etc etc) that you won't find in your more home user oriented kit, and they're pretty stable. On top of that their support is legendary, but they ain't cheap - you're looking at around £125 for the 2800V (which is the same price as the 2800 at the moment), more if you want wireless.

As I say, have a look around the forums - you'll see that a lot of people rate them very highly (kind of the middle ground between your home user kit and Cisco business routers)

[gss03]

What is doing DHCP on the network ?

* SBS
* Router
* Both?

Turn it off on the Router and let SBS do that.

[Paul Boy]

What is doing DHCP on the network ?

* SBS
* Router
* Both?

Turn it off on the Router and let SBS do that.

yes the router is, SBS supports this as it detects the uPnP, SBS configs the router with a couple of clicks.

i'm not sure how to config the SBS to do this? is it difficult?

I can CONFIRM that if i switch off uPnP feature on the router, i have no problems with the vista machine rebooting the router (I can switch netowork discovery, map network drives etc without problems)

Thanks in advance

[Paul Boy]

Just a thought: if the DHCP is not done by the router, the VPN will not work correctly?

[gss03]

yes the router is, SBS supports this as it detects the uPnP, SBS configs the router with a couple of clicks.

i'm not sure how to config the SBS to do this? is it difficult?

I can CONFIRM that if i switch off uPnP feature on the router, i have no problems with the vista machine rebooting the router (I can switch netowork discovery, map network drives etc without problems)

Thanks in advance

Just cause SBS "Supports" UPNP doesn't mean you should use it!

The old addage of SBS is KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid.

Let the router do it's job of being the gateway and let SBS do it's job of DHCP, AD , DNS, Exchange, Sharepoint services, WSUS(if R2), ISA (if Premium).