Sky Broadband White V1 Netgear DG834GT Router Upgrade Rollout Begins

[pauldarkside]

Just noticed that Sky have apparently confirmed an automated firmware upgrade for the white V1 Netgear DG834GT is taking place. Thought a few people might like a heads-up.

Source: http://www.skyuser.co.uk/index.php?news=2837

Sky have today confirmed that the infamous V1 Netgear DG834GT Router Firmware is now being rolled out.

Earlier this week we reported that known staff were reporting on the forums, that the White V1 Router is to have the new FW pushed out, starting this week, from 26th March.

Sky earlier this evening, confirmed to us the following:

We can confirm that we are upgrading the Phase 1 firmware as part of our general maintenance activities; this is being gradually deployed to the entire base through a remote upgrade process.

This is very good news for all of our members and Sky's Customers who have been issued with the White V1 Netgear DG834GT Router on signing up to Sky Broadband.

Those of us, who have been on Sky Broadband since the very beginning, are all too familiar with the issues that people have been experiencing. It was a definite case of people either having no issues whatsoever or nothing but drop outs and poor quality connections.

The most common problems people were having are:

• UPnP when enabled caused the router to Lock Up
• Losing Sync due to Noise Margin dropping during Peak Periods
• MSN Midnight Bug - Disconnecting from MSN dead on Midnight

Although it has taken 18 months or so for this rollout, we do know that Sky have worked their little cotton socks off, and I am positive that this can only be a good thing for us all, with the White V1 Routers now hopefully having the same solid performance as the newer V2 Black Routers.

[Blitzen]

I phoned them 4 weeks back and said mine stopped working.

3 days later a V2 Netgear arrived and its great. Looks just like a mini HD Box.

Runs very very cool and hold the signal far longer.

[pauldarkside]

Mine's been up and running for 17 months and I've yet to experience any major issues with it. (I do have a spare - free replacement which I didn't actually need - from when my land line was causing problems )

Out of interest, does the V2 come with attachments allowing for vertical placement?

[Blitzen]

Yes it does.
Its quite a nice stand actually. Just clips onto the bottom.

The best thing about the V2 that i found was that its cold to the touch. All the V1's seemed to get very hot, very quickly.

[matty-hodgson]

how do you know which version you have?
i'm on Sky Broadband, and have been for about a year now, had a couple of problems with the router, at first it would just DC everyone from it at random times during the day if more than 2 people used it and then i got the MSN bug thing where it would DC me at midnight.

[pauldarkside]

V1 = white
V2 = black

Shouldn't be too difficult to tell the difference

[Re-Invented]

Shouldnt we get a choice, because i aint gonna be to happy if it reverts back to defaults.

Lee

[pauldarkside]

According to what I've read elsewhere, your settings will remain - passwords, rules, etc will not be affected.

If you're using Mognuts/similar (if you don't know what this is then you're unlikely to be using it) it's advised that you stop until a new version is released which works with the new firmware.

One thing which should be noted however, is that if you're using an unofficial firmware version, it won't upgrade automatically; you'd be breaching Sky's T&C and this is an opportunity for Sky to enforce them.

[matty-hodgson]

V1 = white
V2 = black

Shouldn't be too difficult to tell the difference

oh right.. yeah, i think i have the V1
when will my router's firmware be upgraded and will it do it fully automatically?
what difference will i notice aswell?

[pauldarkside]

oh right.. yeah, i think i have the V1

Just don't go anywhere near it with your screwdriver

when will my router's firmware be upgraded

It's unclear at the moment quite how they're rolling out this update. It could be on an exchange by exchange basis, it could be by MAC address group, or by surname/account (your router's MAC address is tied to your Sky Broadband account). I've read it could take a several weeks/months to complete - you'll just have to be patient like the rest of us.

I'd imagine that once a few specific users (there are several of whom write custom firmware upgrades) have received the update it'll made available though other means.

will it do it fully automatically?

Yes.

what difference will i notice aswell?

You might not notice any difference whatsoever. You might notice an increase in reliability with regards to your connection dropouts. You shouldn't have any more issues with MSN and uPNP faults.

Remember though that the router is not the only item which can cause connection problems; it can certainly highlight them. If you're experiencing connection problems it could be down to your land line, distance from local exchange, extension cable, other.

I had a 16 month battle with BT, with multiple engineer visits, as I had a intermittently noisy land line (very difficult to diagnose) and after finally having it fixed (there were corroded couplings a few hundred yards away from my flat) my connection has been 100%.

[Blitzen]

I think the V1's drop out because the router gets very hot.

YOu can also turn UPNP off...that often helps.

[pauldarkside]

I think the V1's drop out because the router gets very hot.

YOu can also turn UPNP off...that often helps.

Possibly. Mine's been running constantly since I received it 17 months ago - it's warm but so far the heat hasn't been causing any faults here. The old firmware does have problems when the noise margin drops too low to maintain a connection - sometimes the router will fail to re-establish a connection forcing the user to reboot the router. I've been using a custom firmware version which allows me to specify when it should force a reset, but as I've said eslewhere, I haven't needed it since having the land line fault resolved.

[pauldarkside]

Update: According to posted over at SkyUers, Sky will be releasing a downloadable image file "in the next few days" so users can perform the update themselves

[fuddam]

the sky is a lovely colour. Think I'll go outside.

[TAKTAK]

the sky is a lovely colour. Think I'll go outside.

erm... yeah... thanks for that

yeh the v1s had a drop out problem for alot of people no particular reason (well there is a reason, its due the router crashing when the noise margin drops) for it but it does seem to be a random occurance and can happen at any time in any weather, theres quite a few posts about it on dslzoneuk.net (a forum all about BB). and also quite alot of people with sky have flashed their routers to the netgear official firmware or ubergt etc, mainly because it gives alot more options in the router its self and lets you tweak your line to get the best stable speed possible.

oh, and don't try and get a free upgraded router out of sky, i tried by being sneaky and turning the router on/off everyfew hours and telling sky it was overheating, and sky turned round and said it was a problem with my line speed being too high and becoming unstable and the router loses connection, took a bit of blagging to convince them not to cap my speed at 0.5Mb , in the end i told them that i decided to vacuum the router and it seems to have solved the problem so no netgear v2 for me, which is a pity cos it holds the connection better on lines with low SNR's.
oh and the fact it looks quite srubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishy to

[Blitzen]

My V2 stays connected at 1 or 2db even

My SKY experience was definitely worse with a V1.