Unable to connect to Internet after rebooting router that is used to create a seperate Wifi Network

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Unable to connect to Internet after rebooting router that is used to create a seperate Wifi Network

This thread has been locked for further replies. You can start a new thread to share your ideas or ask questions.
Unable to connect to Internet after rebooting router that is used to create a seperate Wifi Network
Unable to connect to Internet after rebooting router that is used to create a seperate Wifi Network
2023-04-09 12:52:23
Model: Archer C80  
Hardware Version:
Firmware Version:

Hello! I'm experiencing a problem with my home network setup. I have two Wi-Fi routers connected to each other. The primary router is connected to the internet via DSL and is used for my main home network. The second router (The Archer C80), is connected to one of the LAN ports of the primary router. It is intended to create a separate Wi-Fi network for my smart home devices. Initially, this setup worked well, but recently, the secondary Wi-Fi network has started to crash regularly after rebooting the rooter.

 

The network still appears in my list of available networks and I can join it but it seems to be unable to access the internet (Can't remotely connect to the home assistant instance that's running on the network and I get a warning that I have no internet connection on my mac as soon as i join). Sometimes, after rebooting both routers multiple times, the secondary network starts working again, but the issue persists. As soon as the problem occurs I am also unable to access the admin page of the router (neither tplinkwifi.net nor the ip adress works). What's really strange is, that I am still able to access the router via the cloud functionality of the tether app where it says that the router is connected to the internet. 

 

I really don't know what's going on and have no idea how to fix this issue. I factory reset the router several times, both routers are running the latest firmware, I tried another cable and a different LAN port.

 

I gave the secondary router a static IP on my primary router and configured the Gateway and DNS to be the IP of the primary router. I also configured different DHCP Ranges.

 

I'd be really glad if someone could help me out here! Thanks in advance!

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#1
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Re:Unable to connect to Internet after rebooting router that is used to create a seperate Wifi Network
2023-04-10 19:42:07

  @Malo87,

Do you have your second router operating AP Mode? It is near impossible to have a stable network with two completely separate DHCP servers operating on the network. You will need to set up your C80 in AP mode, which will provide settings for AP isolation, giving you the effect of having your Smart Devices connected to a different network than your main.

 

Technically your setup may work with the correct configurations, however, it is highly vulnerable to changes that would bring the network down.

If you truly wanted to have two separate routers operating in their default configuration, you would need to configure VLANs, which requires much more intensive troubleshooting and more advanced hardware.

 

 

The network issue has to do with your C80 receiving during IP addresses and attempting to configure its ports for a WAN connection, when its really just an extension of the LAN. The crashing is happening because of an IP address conflict, which explains why it happens when you reboot the router, eliminating what the C80 expects to see as the modem assigning the single IP address given to your address.

 

The reason connected devices do not have an active internet connection, is because they are using an IP address that was given by the C80, which your main router is not expecting and does not know what to do with.

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#2
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Re:Unable to connect to Internet after rebooting router that is used to create a seperate Wifi Network
2023-04-10 22:14:59

  @Riley_S 

 

Hi! Thanks for your answer.

 

The router is operating in standard mode right now. I just tried switching to AP mode but that exposed all my devices to the first router which I am trying to prevent to make my home network more secure. I wasn't able to find any settings that would create a seperate network on the C80 in AP mode or find the Isolation settings. Do you know where the AP Isolation settings can be found?

 

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#3
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Re:Unable to connect to Internet after rebooting router that is used to create a seperate Wifi Network
2023-04-10 22:37:25 - last edited 2023-04-10 22:37:42

  @Malo87,

You can always use the emulators to find settings before altering your actual network: https://www.tp-link.com/us/support/download/archer-c80/#Emulators

 

AP isolation is found under the wireless main tab > Additional Settings.

 

You may still need to do some configuration of settings on the main router of your network, depending on what router you are using and how it handles the traffic.

While its a more odd solution, you may have luck setting up the guest networks of the device too, as Guest Networks normally isolate devices or have options to isolate devices in the same way you are looking for.

 

 

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#4
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Re:Unable to connect to Internet after rebooting router that is used to create a seperate Wifi Network
2023-04-11 08:51:43
I thought about using the guest network as a solution but wasn't sure if the configuration would work properly with my setup because I have to set some static IPs in the network. Will I still be able to set static IP on the guest network?
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#5
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