This may sound bizarre, but my neighbour is having trouble with his router going off for approx. 1 hour every night.  He is convinced that the street light outside his house is causing the problem as it is faulty and flickers on and off until it is warmed up. This happens about the same time as loosing the internet.  His provider says that the problem is not at their end

Has anyone ever heard of such a thing, or is it just a weird coincidence?

I have told him to report the light to the council and see if fixing the light solves the problem.

Head scratching time or what

Is he on wifi in the house, or hard wired?

Routers do have a setting which can turn the net off at programmable times so he may have done that by mistake?

Update, just had a phone call from the neighbour and he has been looking out the window and when the street light flickers on and off his router resets its self.  he is going to be on to the Council tomorrow to report the light.  I bet that will be an interesting conversation!

Update, just had a phone call from the neighbour and he has been looking out the window and when the street light flickers on and off his router resets its self.  he is going to be on to the Council tomorrow to report the light.  I bet that will be an interesting conversation!

 

Looking at it another way, the street light might be flickering due to the router resetting!

Have they tried changing channels?

Does he have a surge protector on the line the router is using???

 

It could be RFI, but it could equally be a voltage spike from the faulty light, years ago we had a neighbour with a faulty strip light that used to trip out our RCD breakers.

Have they tried changing channels?

 

What's ITV1 got to do with this????    

Does he have a surge protector on the line the router is using???

 

It could be RFI, but it could equally be a voltage spike from the faulty light, years ago we had a neighbour with a faulty strip light that used to trip out our RCD breakers.

 

+1 I was going to suggest the same.

 

It seems unlikely that the light would do it but, stranger things have happened.

 

It could just be a faulty router.

More likely channel congestion IMO if it happens at a similar time every day

I would start by disconnecting the bell wire on the phone line if that is still connected, and ensuring the router is plugged into the master socket with all extension wiring removed.

 

If the street light is flickering and causing electrical interferance then any extra phone wiring near by could be acting as an aerial and picking this up, and causing the SNR to drop and the router to loose sync on the line.

 

Wifi channel congestion wouldn't cause the router to reboot or for the line to drop (unless the router is a total piece of junk!)

 

http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/lowSNR.htm

SNR can vary on an hour to hour basis, not only is it affected by the speed of your connection but there are other things may reduce your SNR. Hot weather can cause a long line to expand. Wet weather on a connection somewhere could cause dampness and deteriorate the signal. Even street lighting and flashing xmas tree lights have been known to affect SNR."

Ah missed the reboot part.

Wifi channel congestion wouldn't cause the router to reboot or for the line to drop (unless the router is a total piece of junk!)

 

http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/lowSNR.htm

 

If it was supplied by the ISP then that is quite likely.

If a light causes that problem, then one can identify it with a long wave radio set to a weaker station.  Interent interference would also appear as noise on that radio.  Noise heard on a AC powered radio and maybe not heard on a battery powered one.  But testing with both is useful information.

 

Did it reboot?  Did power actually cut off and return?  Or did the modem simply resync?  Exactly what is meant by reboot?

 

And finally, how are all incoming utilities grounded?  All wires should have a common connection to the earth ground.  If some utilties enter at different locations, then their grounds cannot be common.  Just another reason why noise, normaly rejected, is being detected.

Do the light do this every night and do you experience the same problem?

As asked before is the user wireless or wired?

Can the user make a phone call whilst this happens and does the call disconnect or is the call terrible noise wise?

Had the user tried plugging the router into a different socket whilst this is happening and does it make any difference at all?

 

 

I am struggling to believe this is due to BT kit and I suspect this may be due to electrical interference.

What you are describing could be REIN which can be identified by tuning a radio to 312mhz am ,and a buzzing sound will be picked up coming from the street light or something else near by,it is more common than many people think,contact your ISP and advise them that you have the problem.

What you are describing could be REIN which can be identified by tuning a radio to 312mhz am ,and a buzzing sound will be picked up coming from the street light or something else near by,it is more common than many people think,contact your ISP and advise them that you have the problem.

 

Great advice!

 

I bet your ISP dont know about REIN and your past from pillow to post 

Download a copy of routerstats to monitor the line noise.

I would go with the REIN theory (the street light emitting RFI) as it is clearly faulty.

Thanks for all your ideas and suggestions, the Council came along and changed the complete head on the street light and this has now solved the problem. I don't think the guy doing the work actually believed my friend when he told him about the problem, but it worked anyway. Simples!

Great news!