Ok, so I've been with O2 broadband for about a year and I'm quite happy with them. Last month I took the plunge and bought a D-link DNS-323 2-bay NAS. However, whenever I plugged it into my O2 wireless box II (Speedtouch 585v7) router the router would hang periodically. I spoke with O2 and they sent me a replacement router, but the new one does the same thing - it turns out there's a known issue with these routers and some upnp traffic. I tried turning upnp off in the router config pages but that didn't stop the problem. Last night I decided to use my Netgear WNR854T router for all the real work and just use the O2 box as a modem (the 854T doesn't have a built in modem) connected to the router's wan port. However, for some reason the Netgear router refuses to see the NAS at all. The port light doesn't turn on when the nas is connected, it doesn't appear in the attached devices list, and I can't access it through my browser. Worse still, the O2 box still hangs in this configuration. The nas works fine with the the O2 box (except for the hangs). I don't know what to do now. Any suggestions? A bit more info: O2 box is IP 192.168.1.254 connected to the phene line. WNR854T is 192.168.2.1 connected to the 1st port on the O2 box. Main pc (winxp) is 192.168.2.2 by dhcp connected to port 1 of the wnr854t - the internet works fine on this pc. NAS is connected to port 2 on the wnr854t - I tried DHCP, and static ip 192.168.2.99, but no luck. It has been reset to factory settings now.
Thats something I am shocked to see. I was with them for a year and only had about 2 months of actually usable service. So glad to be rid of them. With regards to their HW the O2 box is crap. I would recomend you replace it with say a netgear DGxxx series router. It will give you a much better connection and you wont have it mess up when O2 log in to your router to update it. If you do replace the router DO NOT get rid of the O2 box as if it is not returned to them after about 3 months of finishing your service O2 will charge you £60 for it. If you call them they will send you a returns bag for it.
Thanks for the replies. @SImon Bridgeford: It doesn't seem to, as it worked fine through the O2 box, and the manual doesn't mention a need for a direct connection first. @Andy Mc: I've had a fairly reasonable experience with them although you're right the O2 Box is crap. I am considering buying my own router but I'm weary of buying another netgear product after my experience with the wnr854t (Which was their flagship consumer router when I bought it ~£120). Any router I buy would have to have gigabit ethernet (not so fussed about 802.11n -g is fine) and come in firmly under the £100 bracket.
OK, I have a little update. I've done a bit more research (read: wikipedia ) and found out that while GbEthernet works over cat5 it requires 4 twisted pairs and some cables only have 2. It also suggested that, while the devices might be able to negotiate a connection over 2 pairs, some devices will not "see" each other at all. Anyway, I've dug around in my wire stashes for a bit and found a few spare cat5 cables and tried them out - the first two made no difference, but I hit gold with the third. Everything seems to work fine for the moment, but I'll keep an eye out and let you know. Thanks.
For gigabit networking you need cat 5e cables as a minimum. Ideally though cat 6 is what you want as it Is less prone to cross talk and supports double the frequency, 200mhz instead of 100mhz. The cable should have printed on it what category it is.
