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Draytek 2820 half-bridge to 3700 with DHCP? Help.

Jurisprudence

New Around Here
Hi all, long time SNB stalker, first time poster. I really hope someone can help as this is doing my head in. I've been given (free, yay) a Draytek 2820 wired dsl modem router. Also just bought a Netgear wndr3700 on foot of the SNB review and recommendations on the forum.

But all is not well. I have a 75sq ft apartment nicknamed 'The Bunker' as its built like one and wifi signals die (MBP 5ghz, 15ft, 2 walls to wndr3700= RSSI: −85), especially when streaming even SD video, stutter after about 10ft, no 2.4 or 5ghz interference by other electronics in the apt but there is a wireless tower on a public service building 30ft away which we suspect is killing signals somehow. The apartment came with inbuilt networking, 10/100 only :( back to patch panel in utility room with the wndr3700 + Draytek2820 + NAS. So I have a Belkin N1 Vision in AP mode in the bedroom over lan to wired/wireless clients and an Airport express AP on N to wndr3700 to stream audio to living room speakers.

Device list is (almost all the gear bought 2nd hand, I’m not loaded)
2 Macbook pros (1 wifi, 1 wifi + wired to N1 Vision to patch to wndr3700, always on)
2 Vaio laptops (N wifi to 5ghz on wngr3700)
1 Mac mini (lan to Belkin N1 Vision to wndr3700, always on)
1 Toshiba laptop (G to wndr3700)
2 iphones (G 2.4ghz to wndr 3700, always on)
1 iPad (N to wndr3700 or N1 Vision, always on)
2 PS3's (Lan, 1 to Belkin N1 Vision, 1 to 10/100 patch panel to wndr3700)
1 Popcorn Hour A110 (lan to 10/100 patch panel to wndr3700)
1 Acer Easystore H340 (gigabit lan direct to wndr3700, always on)
1 Brother wifi printer (G to wdnr3700)

As a result of all this I think the wndr3700 is faltering doing PPPoE auth, dsl traffic and DHCP routing wired and wireless (with poss interference leading to error correction issues) as I'm seeing stalling during browsing (Opera 11 with +100 tabs) syncing iDisk + Dropbox, Justnotes, iTunes, Evernote, utorrent running but not hard on Mac's. 3 Macs use Teleport controlled by 1 mouse/keyboard using TCP/IP with DHCP by wndr3700, now very hard to control due to stuttering. Also getting wifi dropouts on the wndr3700. Have flashed firmware but issues persist. Not convinced its faulty, yet.

I need the Draytek 2820 to do PPPoE auth and handle dsl traffic (24mb line, relatively stable) passing back traffic to wndr3700 doing DHCP instead of running 2820n bridged to 3700 to try limit the stress. On top I'm also losing access to all the 2820's features such as failover by running in bridge. I believe a half-bridge mode will do what I want, am I wrong? The Draytek 2820n doesn’t seem to do this but it does have a 'True IP DMZ' mode. Does anyone know if this is essentially the same thing and if so how can I configure it, is it safe? Netgear say none of their products do half-bridge.

Also have a Netgear WNHDE111 HD 5ghz I want to connect to the wndr3700 (via patch panel lan to living room) to take care of 5ghz clients. Have searched and keep finding threads on connecting WNHDE111 to wifi routers via wifi. I'm looking to use the 111 to extend the same SSID of the 3700. Am I dreaming, delusional etc. Sorry for the long post, I'm going crazy trying to figure all this out. Thanks.

PS: Mods please move this if its not the right place, wasn't sure where to put it.
 
First, a diagram would definitely help to understand your setup, which seems like it is overcomplicated with too much unnecessary reliance on wireless.

DHCP isn't a big load on a router, so you're not really offloading anything from either router by having them in cascade (series). I would convert the WNDR3700 to an AP, use it to handle both 2.4 and 5 GHz wireless clients and let the Draytek do all the routing.

10/100 Ethernet is fine to handle HD streaming. I'd move as much as I could to Ethernet and get rid of bridges and extra APs.
 
Hi thiggins, thanks for the reply. Created a image of the current layout. Have used LAN as much as I thought possible but would appreciate any advise that could simplify. Wifi range is truly horrific in my apartment, channel changes appear to have little effect. Already had the WNDR3700 drop wifi tonight on 5ghz N 15ft from MBP laptop through 2 walls. Crazy.

Would love to setup the WHNDE111. I was concerned that if I use the Draytek for DHCP instead of the WNDR3700 I may be decreasing LAN/torrent performance as the Netgear appear to be well thought of in terms of throughput whereas for me the Draytek is an unknown quantity in terms of throughput while it excels in stability. Thanks again.
 

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The WNHDE111 should work fine as an access point. What's the problem / concern?

Be sure that you have the APs set to different channels so that they don't compete for channel bandwidth.
 
Sorry for the late reply, Christmas madness. Gonna have to apologize for the reply itself as it'll be a bit blond. Couple of questions on your advice, thanks for helping BTW.

If I convert the Draytek 2820 to run DHCP + PPPoE auth will I lose the huge throughput speed of the 3700. What I mean is (and this is dim I know) will network traffic go to the Draytek instead of 3700.

So say I'm streaming a video from the NAS (currently connected via Gigabit Lan to 3700) to an MBP connected on N to 3700 will traffic now go from NAS> 3700> Draytek> 3700> MBP instead of NAS> 3700> MBP. My concern is reduced performance especially if the Draytek is running heavy torrent traffic at the time (I usually download while watching something else + browsing, all on different systems). I know the 3700's 680mhz CPU is a powerhouse for a router but does anyone know if the Draytek is its equal or lesser. Reviews of the 2820 are thin on the ground regards torrenting/streaming/gaming as its a business unit really. Am I basically talking through my rear with these fears?

What really does concern me (and may make the above possible reconfiguration academic) is the Draytek experiencing intermittent packet loss (4-10% on occasions from what I checked today) and wild variation in ping times at all times. Google searches have made me wonder if this is a regular issue with the unit or just web moaning. Anyone know if this is true of the 2820 or Draytek in general. Its on the latest 3.3.4.1 firmware. Anyone knows of any beta firmwares or settings available to cure this.

As for the WHNDE111 I had it already setup as an AP with a different SSID to the previous main router (another Belkin N1 Vision which went bang, surprise). Was giving bother to the Mac's Airports attaching from one SSID to another. Didn't know I could just assign the same SSID to an AP and it would join the collective. All setup now with N1, WHNDE111 and 3700 on same SSID. Early days but reception greatly improved in living room. Thanks again.
 
So say I'm streaming a video from the NAS (currently connected via Gigabit Lan to 3700) to an MBP connected on N to 3700 will traffic now go from NAS> 3700> Draytek> 3700> MBP instead of NAS> 3700> MBP. My concern is reduced performance especially if the Draytek is running heavy torrent traffic at the time (I usually download while watching something else + browsing, all on different systems). I know the 3700's 680mhz CPU is a powerhouse for a router but does anyone know if the Draytek is its equal or lesser. Reviews of the 2820 are thin on the ground regards torrenting/streaming/gaming as its a business unit really. Am I basically talking through my rear with these fears?
Uh. yes.

Traffic is going to follow the shortest path. A router only routes traffic flowing through it to/from the Internet. LAN traffic flows through whichever switch ports it needs to travel through to go where it needs to go.

Even if traffic touched both the Draytek and NETGEAR switches, neither CPU gets involved. Switches are separate devices and direct packets based on MAC address.

Where are you seeing packet loss on the Draytek, i.e. what traffic? Packet loss and varying ping times on wireless is normal.
 
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