PDA

View Full Version : Grandstream Reliability Tip



VOIPoTim
09-28-2008, 04:57 PM
Here's a tip for any of you that want to improve speed on your Grandstreams and make things work a little better. Assign the adapter a static IP and static DNS settings on your network.

To do this, access the adapter IP in your browser and login using password 123. The settings in this section will NOT be overwritten by our provisioning system as they relate to your network only.

There have been some cases where users reported they could not register and it turned out the GS did not have an IP address on their network. We've found that this typically happens when the IPs are expiring often and the ATA is constantly pulling a new one.

Rebooting the modem, router, and ATA fixed this, but if you have it set to static it is a non-issue.

While this is not completely necessary, it does speed up booting and wiill improve reliability by eliminating the need to ever change the IP.

burris
09-28-2008, 05:42 PM
Here's a tip for any of you that want to improve speed on your Grandstreams and make things work a little better. Assign the adapter a static IP and static DNS settings on your network.

To do this, access the adapter IP in your browser and login using password 1234. The settings in this section will NOT be overwritten by our provisioning system as they relate to your network only.

There have been some cases where users reported they could not register and it turned out the GS did not have an IP address on their network. We've found that this typically happens when the IPs are expiring often and the ATA is constantly pulling a new one.

Rebooting the modem, router, and ATA fixed this, but if you have it set to static it is a non-issue.

While this is not completely necessary, it does speed up booting and wiill improve reliability by eliminating the need to ever change the IP.

What do you think the best static DNS should...Public or??

VOIPoTim
09-28-2008, 06:02 PM
What do you think the best static DNS should...Public or??

Public should be fine.

We're going to be rolling out new internal DNS servers in the next few days and I'll post info on those. We recommend using them when they're available, but we don't rely so much on DNS updates for redundancy that it's absolutely needed.

usa2k
09-28-2008, 06:24 PM
For me,
I can't go static and use the real world IP from WOW Cable.
Both GS are to a hub that goes to the Modem.
Without NAT it might be more reliable?

Just my PCs are behind a router.

Brian
09-28-2008, 06:54 PM
1234 is not working for my adapter.

christcorp
09-28-2008, 07:03 PM
For a static DNS; I suggest using 1 from your ISP; it will be the fastest DNS being you have to hit your ISP before you go anywhere on the net. As a secondary, I recommend 4.2.2.1 That is a dns from Level 3. It is a public that will not change. Plus; being Level 3 takes care of most of VoipO's routing, it's probably a better DNS to use.

For IP address: USA; when you say both your GS are on a hub to your modem; are you saying that you are paying for multiple static IP's from your ISP? Or, is your modem the type like many that has a built in router? You said that your pc's are behing a router. i assume that the router is getting the "Public IP Address" from your modem; OR it too is getting a "Private IP Address" in the 192.168.x.x range. Unless you're paying for multiple Public IP addresses from your ISP; you can definitely give your GS and all your PC's a static Private IP address. Maybe I am misunderstanding your network setup. Later... Mike....

VOIPoTim
09-28-2008, 07:25 PM
1234 is not working for my adapter.

Should be 123. Sorry.

1bird2
09-30-2008, 12:23 AM
Setting a static IP does not seem to work for me.

I log in as Tim mentions. Set IP address to a private IP in my network (NAT'd behind a FW), set subnet, default route and add two public DNS server addresses (my ISP DNS servers)

I update this info, select "Update". Message returned that values are saved, reboot to take affect. I reboot device remotely. Wait 30 secs and login again.

THe static IP is set (as I login with the new IP address in the browser), but the DNS entries are gone and all set to 0.0.0.0. I also notice I have lost dial tone and LED on GS is now flashing on / off with red color.

Log back in to GS. Reset to Dynamic (note, I have reserved an IP for the GS by MAC address), save configuration, reboot GS. Everything works after I do this (i.e. get dial tone, can make call, phone rings when I call a Virtual number I have assinged to the GS -- as I am waiting for my port to complete).

Thoughts anyone?

Thanks

1bird2

dswartz
09-30-2008, 06:09 AM
Hmmm, sounds like a firmware bug of some sort. Setting a static IP should not have caused it to lose the other settings :( That said, for things like this (I have a GS behind my asterisk box, to service the house wiring), I always go for a 'static dhcp' like you (based on the MAC).

digger16309
11-03-2008, 08:23 AM
Here's a tip for any of you that want to improve speed on your Grandstreams and make things work a little better. Assign the adapter a static IP and static DNS settings on your network.

While this is not completely necessary, it does speed up booting and wiill improve reliability by eliminating the need to ever change the IP.

I have my GS-502 ATA behind my router.

I just had some sort of glitch where it appeared the ATA had a valid IP address from my router and it showed up in the Vpanel. But the ATA kept resetting itself over and over again about every 10-15 seconds. That caused me to have no phone service basically.

After rebooting everything, no change.

I put the ATA in front of the router, no change.

I put the ATA back behind the router, and all was well again. It stopped rebooting itself.

Now that it is working again, I hesitate to fuss with it. But I can't explain what made it go south all of a sudden late Saturday night and all day Sunday. To my knowledge it's the first time this has happened in the 3 weeks I've had the 502.

If I just make the changes in the ATA, is that all I need to do? Or do I also need to make changes in my router to affect this?

zevin
11-03-2008, 11:36 AM
Setting a static IP does not seem to work for me.

I log in as Tim mentions. Set IP address to a private IP in my network (NAT'd behind a FW), set subnet, default route and add two public DNS server addresses (my ISP DNS servers)

I update this info, select "Update". Message returned that values are saved, reboot to take affect. I reboot device remotely. Wait 30 secs and login again.

THe static IP is set (as I login with the new IP address in the browser), but the DNS entries are gone and all set to 0.0.0.0. I also notice I have lost dial tone and LED on GS is now flashing on / off with red color.

Log back in to GS. Reset to Dynamic (note, I have reserved an IP for the GS by MAC address), save configuration, reboot GS. Everything works after I do this (i.e. get dial tone, can make call, phone rings when I call a Virtual number I have assinged to the GS -- as I am waiting for my port to complete).

Thoughts anyone?

Thanks

1bird2

Are we talking about the 286 or the 502?

I tried to set the 286 I have and found the same problem. DNS is back to 0.0.0.0 and no joy.

chpalmer
11-03-2008, 08:19 PM
Put in a ticket and tell them that provisioning keeps blanking out your static settings. They have to fix that on their end. :)

Ive set up my routers to statically assign my equipment their addresses and have no problems this way. ymmv.

zevin
11-03-2008, 10:25 PM
chpalmer I was testing, but I guess I should put in a ticket. I also have my router providing the IP via MAC address like you. So, once I put it back to "my way" I again have joy. I read what 1bird2 had said and was testing and confirming for myself. I would imagine Tim would read this and look into it.

FYI - the IP address stayed only the DNS changed.

1bird2
11-05-2008, 11:51 PM
286. I have since moved to the 502 due to other issues. The 502 is much more reliable. As for this issue/tip, I have not made any changes on the 502. Everything is working well and I am inclined to not make any changes at this time with the DNS settings (static) as per the original post of this thread. I subscribe to the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it...."

-bird

VOIPoTim
11-06-2008, 12:05 AM
286. I have since moved to the 502 due to other issues. The 502 is much more reliable. As for this issue/tip, I have not made any changes on the 502. Everything is working well and I am inclined to not make any changes at this time with the DNS settings (static) as per the original post of this thread. I subscribe to the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it...."

-bird

Glad to hear. The 502 does work for 99% of customers out of the box with no tweaking usually. Overall, it's a great device.

arth
11-06-2008, 12:28 PM
I had my UPS fail last night - my local network was down, GS286 lost power as well as DSL modem and router. I restarted everything without the UPS and all came back up except for the GS286. Used Wireshark to take a look and it appeared the GS286 was hung up on trying to get STUN to bind. It had a static IP address on my local network, I repower it several time, no help. I then reconfigured the GS286 for a dynamic IP and it immediately registered and is operational. Not sure what is happening, as some time ago the same happened when the GS286 was configured with a dynamic IP and setting it to static allowed it to become active.

digger16309
11-06-2008, 02:23 PM
I had my UPS fail last night - my local network was down, GS286 lost power as well as DSL modem and router. I restarted everything without the UPS and all came back up except for the GS286. Used Wireshark to take a look and it appeared the GS286 was hung up on trying to get STUN to bind. It had a static IP address on my local network, I repower it several time, no help. I then reconfigured the GS286 for a dynamic IP and it immediately registered and is operational. Not sure what is happening, as some time ago the same happened when the GS286 was configured with a dynamic IP and setting it to static allowed it to become active.

Sounds like maybe it might have been related to this?


I believe this is resolved for everyone now.

We had a flood of tickets tonight about this and finally discovered a big issue on our end resulting from a change we just made today.

Basically, we made some final changes to the provisioning servers today and there was an error in the test where the config file being passed to the 502s was not fully correct. When an IP renewed or you rebooted a 502 this evening, it would resync with our provisioning servers and download the bad config. Since it was a bad config, it didn't know what to do with it and just cycled.

We've corrected this now and I think it'll resolve the issue for everyone.

So far in all tickets where we've gotten a response back and in all our internal testing, it's been resolved.

I apologize for the inconvenience and am am going to sit down and discuss our dev to production procedures tomorrow to make sure we're all on the same page and clear that everything is to be tested before being pushed out.

If anyone is still seeing the cycling, please turn your ATA off for a few minutes then reconnect it. Once it syncs back up with us (make take a minute or so), it should pull a valid config file and will likely reboot 1 time.

If you're still having issues, please e-mail support@voipo.com and let us know.