Ongoing Issues with Max Hub Connectivity

[Polly9]

Hi,

I was upgraded to a Max Hub about 3-4 months ago and have experienced persistent issues ever since.

Here’s a summary of the problems:

1. Mini Box Connectivity: The mini box won’t connect, although the Q box generally works (Cat 6 connection). However, the Q box does occasionally drop off but usually reconnects itself, or with help going through reset, within a few hours or days. The mini box constantly displays the message: “Not connected to the internet.” This issue is not occasional but persistent. Mini is connected with Cat 6 cable. The engineer has tried to set this up wifi as well as Cat 6. Mini box has been replaced twice.
2. Ring Cameras: My  wired Ring cameras frequently disconnect, and it’s challenging to reconnect them afterward, currently I have not been able to connect them. However, all Wi-Fi Ring products connect without any issues and stay connected. (cameras are wifi not Cat 6)
3. Booster Pods: I have three booster pods installed, but they improved the general wifi range for laptops but don’t seem to resolve the issue with anything else. (2 are connected with Cat6, one if wifi)
4. Frequent Dropouts: Everything that disconnects drops off at the same time.

Additional Information:

• Network Configuration: The network is configured to use both the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands.
• Engineer Feedback: Engineers have said that all  Max Hubs are having trouble connecting with third-party products. Despite five engineer visits, the issues remain unresolved. Every time an engineer visits, it takes hours to get devices connected, but everything drops off again within 1-2 days. Last time they were unable to reconnect the Ring only managed to get the mini connected.
• Hub and Device Indicators: The hub does not show any error lights during dropouts. Mini box says not connected to the internet.
• Firmware: The firmware has been updated to the latest version.
• Ring have replaced the cameras to confirm it is not their issue. 
• Cat 6 All other Cat 6 connnections work fine and connections have been checked on the mini. 

I’ve had engineers visit five times already, with the latest visit scheduled for this week. I’ve had to book a new appointment within a days of each visit. Every time they leave it drops again.

Does anyone have similar experiences or suggestions on what might be causing these issues? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!

[Chrisee]

@Polly9 your main problems semm to be related to wired devices given the number I assume you have st least one Ethernet switch what type is that? I have two unmanaged Netgear switches that operate well but a misconfigured managed switch could cause issues? 

Another potential cause is the Q boxes as their, now ancient, mesh networking system is not compatable with the white hubs and even when hard wired has been known to reduce speeds and generally mess up the network stability. Does the network stabilise if the Q boxes are powered down?

Switching from Sky Q to Sky Stream might be a possible solution. Although quite a different product the Stream pucks are simple network clients and play nicely with the new hub/pods system. It is critical though that the pucks are either hard wired or have a good wifi connection. Picture quality is improved over Q and whike you cannot record the access to on demand content makes that pretty irrelevant in my experience.

[Polly9]

Hi Chrisee

Thanks for such a quick responce.

I have a data box rather than a switch, it has been checked and confirmed it is working correctly. I moved recently and hard wired the whole flat. While I get your point on changing to stream it won't sort my Ring connection issues which bother me more than the TV.

Thanks anyway, happy if you have any more advice

[Chrisee]

@Polly9 I cannot guarantee switching to Stream will sort the issue but run a test with the Q boxes powered down to see if the wired cameras stabilise if they do implies the Q boxes are at least part of the problem.

No idea what you mean by a "data box" but anything other than a simple unmanaged etgernet switch needs to be configured correctly this is not my area of expertise but factors like an incorrect mtu setting can screw up connectivity so the unit msy operate correctly but cause issues when combined with the hub. @TimmyBGood or @jamesn123 any ideas?

[TimmyBGood]

@Chrisee @Polly9 

The only 'data box' I know of is an incredibly expensive SSD array loaned by Microsoft to move up to a petabyte of corporate data from local servers into Azure, so it's probably not that.

Because ethernet 'switch' is rather unintuitive, some users don't recognise that's what they are.  'Hub' (for their predecessor) was always a better description: 'packet switching' is OK as a concept but creates a clumsy name.

[Polly9]

Hi

Thanks for your feed back. I might have miss named it. The router is linked to a big metal box that then has multipal cat cables attached to it and these go to cat ports in every room. This has been check by sky engineers and they are happy with it. The bosters and some devices like the q box and mini and then pluged into those ports using eithernet/cat cables. My goal is to get the mini box and ring cameras to link to the router. Does this help?

[Polly9]

Ill try that thanks

[Robrat]

I have had innumerable issues with the sky max hub and have come to the conclusion it's a fundamentally rubbish router. I've now invested in a full home mesh network from TP Link, in part ethernet wired, and turned off the sky max WiFi. It's fixed everything and the router now is functioning simply as a modem.