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I might be going crazy, but when my wife leaves the house, I lose connection to our wireless network. It has happened enough times that there has to be something wrong with how my router handles the connection to my wife's phone or my laptop. What gives?

While working from home I am:

  • On a laptop
  • Connected to our home Wifi (NetGear Nighthawk, AC1750 Smart WiFi Router; model R6700; 5ghz band)
  • Connected to my work VPN

My wife has a Samsung S21 connected to the same wifi. I'm working great all morning with no issues. My wife leaves the house and once she's out of range:

  • My VPN connection drops
  • My laptop loses connection to the Wifi
  • My phone loses connection to the Wifi
  • Looking at the router logs, it appears to have rebooted.
  • After a few minutes everything reconnects and I'm back to working.

I have made sure we are on the latest router firmware.

Any ideas on what settings to check?

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6
  • 1
    Do you have a spare router and can set her up on that for science?
    – Journeyman Geek ♦
    Commented Aug 4, 2023 at 15:05
  • 3
    Are you using a hotspot tied to your wife's phone?
    – fred_dot_u
    Commented Aug 4, 2023 at 17:20
  • 2
    Make sure you've updated the firmware, since that just sounds like it's bugging out and crashing: netgear.com/support/product/r6700#download. For sanity, make sure it doesn't have a daily/weekly reboot scheduled (nighthawks also have a "Turn off wireless signal by schedule" option to check for)
    – Cpt.Whale
    Commented Aug 4, 2023 at 19:07
  • @fred_dot_u, good question, but we aren't. It's a standard fiber line to the provider's modem then ethernet to my wifi router.
    – Josh Jay
    Commented Aug 7, 2023 at 14:01
  • @Cpt.Whale, we were already on the latest firmware. I turned on the QoS settings and put my laptop as the "highest" priority. I'll have to monitor this week and see if I have any further issues.
    – Josh Jay
    Commented Aug 7, 2023 at 14:03

1 Answer 1

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I think the issue has been resolved, though I only have a hypothesis about the root cause. Since I turned on the QoS and set my laptop to the "Highest" priority, I haven't had my connection drop.

My hypothesis is that the router was straining to keep my wife's phone connected because it had somehow been prioritized. Unfortunately, I can't really confirm. I do think turning on QoS is the real solution in my case. When my wife left this morning, both my laptop and my phone stayed connected, so it likely wasn't just the priority change of my laptop.

Adding this answer here to close the loop and maybe help someone else in the future. I'll update if I learn more.

QoS Setting

enter image description here

I ran the "Take a Speed Test" after turning the QoS setting on.

enter image description here

Priority Setting

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