Thanks everybody! We've had Fios for probably 2 1/2 years. Worked very well up till last summer, probably July. Something happened.
We're in Eastern Massachusetts, about 40 minutes outside Boston. I didn't find any major upgrades poking around the web, but I don't know where to look. Thanks, I will look at the firmware. It was new in the box when we got it.
We don't usually use more than 1 or 2 ports. The phone (MagicJack) is on one port. Rarely ever used. Probably get rid of it when the contract is over. I have one line to my office, and the cheap NetGear GS108PE switch is there. I usually use one computer, sometimes two. The other lines in the house, sometimes someone is on one computer while Im working.
So, I pulled all the connections off the router, reset the router, reset the FIOS interface. Then I dragged one computer down to the basement and plugged it into the router directly. Seemed to behave about the same. Lousy, stop and start internet. I have a link to an AMD video card driver download, its about 600mb. Its my test download. Since the problem cropped up, it fails download with network timeout most of the time. Sometimes, it says it completed, but only downloaded part of the file and won't run. Arrghhh. (pulling my hair out).
Thewan, thanks, I will call the ISP, I haven't done that yet. Verizon is so MISERABLE to deal with here, their tech support is just about useless. The last time I talked to them right after the install, it was literally all day on the phone. All day. I lost a days work getting transferred from one support rep to another one.
Unfortunately, the dang power and network/phone/cable are all underground on this street. Really stupid idea. I haven't had a problem related to that before but maybe water leaked down there. I will call them tomorrow, gearing up for a miserable experience. (And Verizon has the nerve to put those ads that they have such great customer service).
Mussels: I have 5 hard wired lines down to the basement, with new Cat6 cable. 3 are connected since this router only has 4 ports, and 1 is in use by the magic jack phone. The switch in my office is a cheap one, its a gigabit rated, but cheap. I have plugged directly into the wall outlet, no change. Then, I switched cables, to another one I had, no change. I also have a 100 foot Cat 6 cable my son bought a few years ago. I ran that temporarily down the stairs to the basement, and plugged directly into the router, no change.
Re "every single step of the way hardware can fail, and some have known problems like intels 2.5Gbe having dropouts if EEE is enabled" Wooh, did not know that, thanks. I will check the router for settings. I have reset it a bunch of times by now, but never checked for EEE.
Something new: yesterday I poked all around and found a bad ethernet patch cable. I have it in a pile not used but I DID use it on some of the computers. The metal contacts in the cable have some green corrosion, like water dripped on it for years. I don't use it now, but I might have plugged it in one of the computers. Wondering if that could have damaged the router's circuit? If so, could it damage all 4 ports?
Thanks everyone. I'll post updates after I call the ISP. Also, I have an old slow router, it worked fine, just slow, we used it before switching to fios. Maybe I'll see if that works and doesn't have the glitchy problems.
Oh the pain!
We don't have any newer fast wireless computers. We have old iPad's but they are very old, and very slow anyway. The cat 6 wiring is 24ga bought bulk from Home Depot. I checked that it didn't have any kinks, but not sure if there isn't a kink someplace, maybe in the attic. will crawl around and check again. The cat 6 lines are no more than 75 feet. The ones downstairs are much shorter.
