# Deca And router firewall problems



## jprosiak (Sep 10, 2006)

He is the scenario. Last November I had an hr24 and two h25 receivers installed with whole home setup. Everything worked fine until last Sunday when suddenly my receivers were no longer getting an ip address from my router. Instead it was getting a 169.x.x.x ip address and had no Internet access. The light on the deca box also confirmed it had no network access. The only way I could get the deca box to get network access and get the receivers on my network was to disable the router firewall. After I disabled the firewall the deca box connected and all my receivers were on my network. I then enabled the firewall again and I have had no problems.

Directv has not been able to tell my why their deca box suddenly had a problem with my firewall and why it wasn't able to get an IP address from my router until it had Internet access. Can anyone shed some light on this? 

I want to understand what their hardware is requiring on my network.


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## Stuart Sweet (Jun 19, 2006)

It might be helpful to know what model router this is. It sounds odd... generally a firewall will only block traffic from outside the network and wouldn't have an effect inside the network.


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## jprosiak (Sep 10, 2006)

Linksys E5400 I believe.

I was trying to explain that to the tech as well, but he wasn't understanding it. The only thing I can guess is that the deca was expecting something from DTV to send a packet back to enable it???? Just a guess.

But if that were the case I would assume that the box would have had problems once I enabled the firewall again. (unless there is a TTL value that is extremely long and the box doesn't request an update for months)


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## Stuart Sweet (Jun 19, 2006)

Can I presume you've rebooted the router? Also try disabling and re-enabling the internal DHCP server.


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## jprosiak (Sep 10, 2006)

Yes I did all of that. The only way I was able to get that stupid deca box to work was to disable and then enable the firewall once it was connected. If I hard wired the hr24, it obtained an ip via dhcp and had Internet access but my whole home features were disabled.


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

While I do know the DECA quite well, routers aren't a strong suit of mine.

What I'm reading here is a problem in the router, so I'd look into resetting it, and trying a factory reset of the "normal" reset didn't clear the glitch.

I have had a router block all traffic to the point I thought it had failed and as I was throwing it out, noticed the factory reset button.
Used it and everything came back.


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## jprosiak (Sep 10, 2006)

"veryoldschool" said:


> While I do know the DECA quite well, routers aren't a strong suit of mine.
> 
> What I'm reading here is a problem in the router, so I'd look into resetting it, and trying a factory reset of the "normal" reset didn't clear the glitch.
> 
> ...


I appreciate your feed back, but resetting the router is not a path I am willing to take. The deca box was working fine since last November then all of a sudden it didn't want to connect to the network. Also, a device shouldn't have to get Internet access to assign a local IP. Like I stated in my OP, For what ever reason the deca wouldn't assign a local ip via dhcp to any of the STBs without disabling the firewall temporarily. There are a few questions here
1. Why wouldn't the deca assign local IPs to the DTV STBs until it had access to the internet?
2. Why would temporarily disabling the firewall resolve this issue?
3. If directv requires inbound access to my network via the Deca , What are they doing and what other access to my network are they granted via their STB?

No one at DTV has been able to answer these questions.


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

jprosiak said:


> I appreciate your feed back, but resetting the router is not a path I am willing to take. The deca box was working fine since last November then all of a sudden it didn't want to connect to the network. Also, a device shouldn't have to get Internet access to assign a local IP. Like I stated in my OP, For what ever reason the deca wouldn't assign a local ip via dhcp to any of the STBs without disabling the firewall temporarily. There are a few questions here
> 1. Why wouldn't the deca assign local IPs to the DTV STBs until it had access to the internet?
> 2. Why would temporarily disabling the firewall resolve this issue?
> 3. If directv requires inbound access to my network via the Deca , What are they doing and what other access to my network are they granted via their STB?
> ...


1 & 2 point directly to the router as the cause.
"I think" the router as flagged the HR24 to be blocked from your network. Going with ethernet simply changes this flag.
You might see if changing the CCK connection to the router to another port changes anything.

A path you're not willing to take, limits troubleshooting.

You can go after all the DECA devices and swap them out, swap out the receiver, and still find it's in the router.
Or you can look at the router and find it isn't the problem, and then follow the swapping.
Part of troubleshooting is finding what isn't the problem.

"I know DECA", so there isn't anything in it that blocks one device and doesn't any others. They can be defective, but it doesn't fail in a way that matches your problem.


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## jprosiak (Sep 10, 2006)

"veryoldschool" said:


> 1 & 2 point directly to the router as the cause.
> "I think" the router as flagged the HR24 to be blocked from your network. Going with ethernet simply changes this flag.
> You might see if changing the CCK connection to the router to another port changes anything.
> 
> ...


Why would the deca not connect to my router at all? If all that was problematic was getting Internet access I would agree it was a firewall issue, but since it wouldn't even obtain an IP from my router it has to be something with the hardware. 
Everything worked initially and almost 10 months later stopped working (even with a new router) I am inclined to believe the deca box is attempting some type of communication back from DTV and their TTL is VERY long. Also, everything works after disabling and then enabling the firewall, so once again, if it were a firewall problem I would expect the deca box to drop connection again.

Everything is working now, but I REALLY want to understand why this was a problem.


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

jprosiak said:


> Why would the deca not connect to my router at all? If all that was problematic was getting Internet access I would agree it was a firewall issue, but since it wouldn't even obtain an IP from my router it has to be something with the hardware.
> Everything worked initially and almost 10 months later stopped working (even with a new router) I am inclined to believe the deca box is attempting some type of communication back from DTV and their TTL is VERY long. Also, everything works after disabling and then enabling the firewall, so once again, if it were a firewall problem I would expect the deca box to drop connection again.
> 
> Everything is working now, but I REALLY want to understand why this was a problem.





> I had an hr24 and two h25 receivers installed with whole home setup.


 Did you ever have a problem with the H25s?

"if yes", then a DECA problem.
"If no", it isn't a DECA problem.

"If" the HR24's internal DECA was the problem, 
"Then" disabling the firewall would have no effect.


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## jprosiak (Sep 10, 2006)

"veryoldschool" said:


> Did you ever have a problem with the H25s?
> 
> "if yes", then a DECA problem.
> "If no", it isn't a DECA problem.
> ...


One H25 couldn't pull up a play list, but the other couldn't. In fact the one that could pull a play list wouldn't even power on at first. I had to unplug it and let it sit for 30 seconds the plug it back in. Once it was running, we could pull a play list and then the other H25 could pull a play list. A few minutes later the deca connected to the network.

I wonder if disabling the firewall was just a red herring. Maybe it is entirely possible that it would have connected if we just gave it another minute.

(I forgot about the other H25 being really mucked up)


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

jprosiak said:


> One H25 couldn't pull up a play list, but the other couldn't. In fact the one that could pull a play list wouldn't even power on at first. I had to unplug it and let it sit for 30 seconds the plug it back in. Once it was running, we could pull a play list and then the other H25 could pull a play list. A few minutes later the deca connected to the network.
> 
> I wonder if disabling the firewall was just a red herring. Maybe it is entirely possible that it would have connected if we just gave it another minute.
> 
> (I forgot about the other H25 being really mucked up)


Red herrings and muddy waters.

I could only reply to what was put forth.


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