I have a 12 mbps internet at home via AT&T UVerse. I find AT&T’s service to be reliable and very good. Before that, it was Bell South DSL and that too was good. However, before switching from DSL to UVerse, I used to require the modem restarts about once every 10 days. So I seriously looked into buying an automatic timer to weekly reboot the the modem. No such need since the UVerse switch a few years ago.
But… the modem (or is it a Gateway?) that came with UVerse is an ancient Motorola NVG 510: No 5 GHZ WiFi and no network ‘loopback’ and very little control over network computers compared with some other, even cheaper, routers. In case you are wondering, what is ‘loopback’: It’s a network provision which allows publicly available domain (such as dev.alphaobjects.com –where my virtual tours are hosted) to be accessible from within the home network. Lack of loopback support means I can’t see content under dev.alphaobjects.com from within my home. And that has been very irritating and frustrating over the years!
I tried to go around that by adding another router (a DLINK one) to the network and made the NVG 510 to be just a gateway (not a router). While that arrangement mostly worked: The loopback was working AND I had the 5 GHZ WiFi–it was not perfect. Often DLINK and the 510 would not be happy campers and thus dropped internet signals etc. So I dropped the DLINK!
But lately I have more needs to have dev.alphaobjects.com to be available from inside the network and so I just checked with AT&T support and they have promised to ship an updated modem FREE of charge to me very soon. Yay!! They can’t tell me which model that’s going to be. Well, it will be free, so no sweat! If problems arise then I will contact them.
Needless to say, I am very excited and can’t wait to try the new modem. Hopefully, I will have more customization options, will have the loopback functionality, and will have the 5 GHZ network. We will see soon! But THANK YOU AT&T for your generosity!!
Fingers crossed!!
Update on 17 June 2017: I should have known it was too good to be true!! AT&T sent me yet another NVG 510 except this time it had ‘Arris’ on it. I hooked it up and this one, too, didn’t have the 5 GHZ WiFi available and, of course, no NAT Loopback. I quickly removed it from the network and hooked up the old one. The only ‘updated’ part was that this one had ‘Arris’ on the device, I guess! And, too put salt on my wounds, they ARE adding the $7/month extra for the device–the guy I chatted with above some days ago didn’t even mention that charge! So today I chatted angrily with AT&T and they have apologized and are going to send a Motorola NVG 599.
Fingers Crossed Again!!
Update on 1 July 2017: So the NVG 599 did arrive a few days ago and it does offer 5 GHZ WiFi option. But… doesn’t support the NAT Loopback. While 5 GHZ maybe good in some ways, I don’t like that the signal range is not as good as the good old 2.4 GHZ. I am not going to pay the extra $7 to AT&T for the new modem unless it supports the Loopback. Going to call AT&T soon!
Update #2 on 1 July 2017: All cool now! Turns out that I had to disable the ‘Default Host’ setting and then do appropriate Port Forwardings to the home server. The NVG 510, after that change, started to show the local server inside the network too (so Loopback working) but NVG 510 was constantly changing the internal IP address of the home server; the NVG 599 honors the static IP address assigned to the home server. So NVG 599 is a keeper! I don’t mind the extra $7/month. The 510 will act as a backup modem.
PS. Spoke to ATT support today. They wanted me to enroll in some ‘Plus’ support plan at an extra $15/month with one year commitment to troubleshoot the Loopback issue. Their explanation for the problem was bizarre! They said my home server was still looking for the old 510. Idiots!
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