Superhub : 50Mb Business Package with Static IP Address - Loses settings

[pandaking]

Hi

We have the 50Mb business fiber broadband package with static IP address.

For the last year, once a month on average, the "superhub" forgets/loses all its settings and our internet dies. I have to connect to it, enter in a variety of settings alongside reboots for each of these - before all is back up and running again. It is now doing this a minimum of twice a day and I can't have no internet in the office overnight as it kills our emails.

We have been offered the free upgrade to the new service, something like 150Mb which has the new Superhub with no ongoing issues - however this doesn't support a static ip address. If I want my static IP address I have to stay on the 50Mb with this broken superhub. Virgin have said that they can't help solve this, that it's a known ongoing issue and I should go elsewhere...

I appreciate Virgin's candid response, however I was wondering if anybody on this forum knew of this ongoing issue and had any tips?

Many thanks

[ccarmock]

I have the same service as you and do not have the problem you describe, though know several others have reported the same thing.

They are due to launch new business services in February next year which will use a different Hub device so should mean they will offer fixed IP addresses on faster services also.

This issue appears to have been caused after a firmware upgrade to the superhub. They are not saying why they won't roll back to the previous one - I suspect due to some vulnerability they feel is more urgent that the disruption!

While it's no fix for your problem - one thing you can do to make the recovery faster is save the settings of your superhub to a file after you get it working again.

Then if it stops working just load the settings, reboot and it should be good for a while again.

Out of interest do you have a routed subnet option or single fixed IP address option?

Really poor they don't have a fix / rollback in place for this.

[General Maximus]

yeah, it is one thing screwing residential customers over but I cant believe how they treat business customers with an sla

[ccarmock]

I agree. For the most part I have found the business service very good, with faults very well handled. But this whole firmware issue has been ridiculous. Prior to this version of firmware (which thy said added SIP ALG and some bug fixes) it was fairly stable. But since the update several people here reported this hanging and loss of settings.

I heard they would roll it back for some customers for a while, but no refuse to do that. There must have been something seriously wrong with the earlier firmware (albeit hidden from the customer) to refuse to roll it back.

I have heard it from two separate people within VMB now that February is the launch date for the 100 , 200 and 300 Mb/s business services and all should have fixed IP options on the new hub. My understanding is that they don't plan a new version of firmware for the Netgear derived SH1 for business and that the fix will be a swap out of the device.

I was further told the new device was due to launch for business in November originally, and the reason it was delayed was a security vulnerability was discovered in the firmware.

Hopefully when it eventually arrives it will be a solid device. I wonder if it will be the same device currently on trial and with some installs taking place, or whether there will be a separate one for business services.

I have a SH1 with my 50 Mb/s service the only thing is it runs different firmware to cater for the fixed IP options.

[pandaking]

It is interesting you say February it will be fixed. It makes things more complicated as I have been considering moving provider - but by the time that all works itself out February will be here.

Then again, I am hesitant to believe the February date, as we have been promised a fix for this current issue for about 8 months.

Using the file to upload settings is a good suggestion, however the biggest issue for me is that we need to rewire our network switch to put the computer directly into the hub, then edit the IP address settings on the computer to allow us to connect to it, before we can edit any settings. This is somewhat complicated and hard to understand for others if I am not in the office.

I'm so disgusted with how we have been treated, I really don't want to give any more money to Virgin. However, for proper broadband offering there is not really anyone else to choose from.

[ccarmock]

I know how you fee, and agree that the way this has been handled is very poor. The fact they would not roll back the faulty firmware make me suspicious that there as some vulnerability in the earlier version that they would not go back to.

You are also right about the date changing a few times. I have had the February date confirmed by a number of VMB people now so am starting to believe it is as confirmed as it can be.

The current superhub I understand, will not be fixed as they plan to move to a new device that will offer the new higher speed services.

[dfhage]

According to tech support, a firmware fix will be rolled out before Christmas, I'm not holding my breath !

[vm_tech]

I doubt it. Without saying too much, and you can probably work out from previous posts, the solution isn't going to be a firmware update for the SH1

[ccarmock]

Indeed - as mentioned in my earlier post, and freely mentioned by Business sales, the new service, due to launch in February will be based around a new business hub.

The person I spoke to recently suggested there will not be any further firmware updates for the Business SH1, and that the fix for any issues will be a swap to the new device.

Of course it's possible sales are wrong!

[Kushan]

That's not such a terrible thing, the SH1 is garbage.

[ccarmock]

Agreed - the business SH1 is the same device as the standard one just with different firmware. The most recent of which is a fair bit older that the equivalent consumer version.

Hopefully the new business hub will be a lot better.

sales told me that the new device will support the fixed IP option at the higher speeds, which aren't supported on the SH1.

There was talk here about issues with PPP at the higher speeds, which I assume was CPE related as opposed to CMTS

[vm_tech]

The new hardware will support static IP's across all speeds

[ccarmock]

Sounds good - so it was the SH1 that had problems with PPP much about 50 Mb/s?