Rogers Ignite TV - Alternate wifi/connection possibilities

[Gdkitty]

Creating this thread so we can separate any discussion about alternate methods of connectivity 
(if at all possible still, etc)

- Bridge Mode - is it capable of connecting the boxes to your own modem

- Wired connection

- How to connect these boxes in those methods.

*Edited Labels*

[Sundog1966]

Since both the TV channel your currently watching and your browser traffic for your computer are now running over ip on the same internet connection I would imagine your still need enough bandwidth to handle the equivalent of  a 4: . loooking at sites such as  https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/columnist/2017/12/10/youre-buying-4-k-tv-how-much-internet-bandw... suggests  up to 25Mbps for a single 4K feed and we can figure  at least 100MBps for your data feed for your laptop t ostream 4k netflix. add some overhead for signalling and control and I could see a 256Mbps minimum ethernet channel. and you also have to account for multiple family members using the channel as well another 200Mbps for each and you quickly get to 500Mbps with just 3 or four users using both a laptop and a 4k tv channel on thier tv in thier rooms.

Don't forget that the  neighborhood feed is still analog so they are splitting the  rg56 into channels  outside of your house until they reach a point where its fiber in the neighborhood. Ideally you will only have RG56 from the neighborhood tap to your house and fiber behind that tapp to the head end.

[57]

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@Sundog1966 wrote:

Don't forget that the  neighborhood feed is still analog so they are splitting the  rg56 into channels  outside of your house until they reach a point where its fiber in the neighborhood. Ideally you will only have RG56 from the neighborhood tap to your house and fiber behind that tapp to the head end.

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I'm not sure where you get this information, but Rogers has been Fibre to the node for many years, often with "loop distribution" so that if one line is cut, the signal can often go "the other way around" to the node.  The "last mile" has been RF-Coax, usually RG11 or better next to the home.  Plenty of bandwidth there to the home, unlike twisted pair.  Inside the home it's usually RG6 or, on older homes, RG59 on legacy installations.

Rogers also has not been analogue for years.

[Pauly]

I asked a question not too long ago, but could not get a definitive answer.  Does the ignite IPTV set top boxes consume regular internet traffic, or is it un-metered internet traffic thru a separate virtual LAN or subset or network of some sort?  The reason I ask is because they are offering it only with the 0.5 gigabit ignite internet which comes already unlimited but what if they offer new teirs down the road some peple want to save money and maybe slower tiers will have less speed and have a data cap?  who knows its a valid question and its worth asking

[andrew9446]

Don't really know for sure if its VLAN, but I have done speed tests with 2 ignite boxes on 2 different channels, and it had no affect on the speedtest whatsoever, as it maintained max speeds both down and up.

[SimplePanda]

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@Pauly wrote:

I asked a question not too long ago, but could not get a definitive answer.  Does the ignite IPTV set top boxes consume regular internet traffic, or is it un-metered internet traffic thru a separate virtual LAN or subset or network of some sort?  The reason I ask is because they are offering it only with the 0.5 gigabit ignite internet which comes already unlimited but what if they offer new teirs down the road some peple want to save money and maybe slower tiers will have less speed and have a data cap?  who knows its a valid question and its worth asking

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Having seen a diag output on an Ignite box the other day all I can add to this is that it looked to me like the box was IPv6 only; specifically, it got a full public IPv6 address and had no assigned IPv4 address, yet service was still working.

The IPv6 address seemed like a standard Rogers prefix so I'm guessing there is no VLAN involved.

I'd also guess the Ignite traffic counts towards your cap but it's moot because the fastest package that still has a cap from Rogers is 30Mbps and Ignite TV would be problematic to offer on a tier that slow. Basically, Ignite TV requires unlimited internet.

This wouldn't be any different than Bell Alt TV, which works similarly to Ignite TV in terms of transport technology. 

[kibosh]

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@SimplePanda wrote:

Having seen a diag output on an Ignite box the other day all I can add to this is that it looked to me like the box was IPv6 only; specifically, it got a full public IPv6 address and had no assigned IPv4 address, yet service was still working.

And when I bridge the modem and use my own ASUS router I notice that the address the box gets is IPv4 in the hidden diagnostic screen.  I can almost get it all working except for Netflix for some reason.  All the other apps and live TV work otherwise . . . soooo close.

[mozerd]

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@kibosh wrote:

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@SimplePanda wrote:

Having seen a diag output on an Ignite box the other day all I can add to this is that it looked to me like the box was IPv6 only; specifically, it got a full public IPv6 address and had no assigned IPv4 address, yet service was still working.

And when I bridge the modem and use my own ASUS router I notice that the address the box gets is IPv4 in the hidden diagnostic screen.  I can almost get it all working except for Netflix for some reason.  All the other apps and live TV work otherwise . . . soooo close.

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 I have not done any work on the new Rogers IPTV platform so my contribution is pure guessing at this time .... Netflix offers their service via ISP like Rogers throught their OCA delivery system -- OCA stands for Open Connect Appliance --- Link follows that may be of help https://media.netflix.com/en/company-blog/how-netflix-works-with-isps-around-the-globe-to-deliver-a-...

i suspect that it’s tied to Netflix CDN so you may need to find out which DNS is being utilized.

[SimplePanda]

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@kibosh wrote:

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 And when I bridge the modem and use my own ASUS router I notice that the address the box gets is IPv4 in the hidden diagnostic screen.  I can almost get it all working except for Netflix for some reason.  All the other apps and live TV work otherwise . . . soooo close.

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Does your ASUS router hand out an IPv6 prefix to your LAN? Wondering if the XI6 Netflix app needs / expects both V4 and V6 to function properly (as little sense as that makes).

[kibosh]

Yes. The ASUS is handing out IPv6 addresses to all clients. In fact in the connections tab it appears the xi6 gets up to 3 different IPv6 addresses (not sure why that is). For some reason it appears it is prioritizing a IPv4 external IP though through the ASUS while it shows a IPv6 external address through the XB6 gateway.

[SimplePanda]

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@kibosh wrote:
Yes. The ASUS is handing out IPv6 addresses to all clients. In fact in the connections tab it appears the xi6 gets up to 3 different IPv6 addresses (not sure why that is). For some reason it appears it is prioritizing a IPv4 external IP though through the ASUS while it shows a IPv6 external address through the XB6 gateway.

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Most IPv6 devices have multiple addresses when they are on a stateless network (most consumer networks).

One of those addresses is computed based on the MAC address of the Ethernet or WiFi interface on the Xi6 itself. That is a permanent address that the device maintains at all times.

The problem is that because it's based on the MAC address, anyone who receives a packet from the device itself will also know the MAC address. This is a security issue on the public internet, but having that MAC based IPv6 address on the local network is super useful for network administration (you always know the IP address of a device on an IPv6 network if you know the local prefix being used and the MAC address of the device you're connecting to).

The second of those addresses will an IPv6 address that is randomly generated and is the "current" address of the device. Whenever the device opens a new connection it will use that address to make that connection rather than it's permanent MAC based address. It does this to hide it's MAC address from the public internet.

The third (or sometimes 4th, 5th, etc) addresses you'll see are "former" randomly generated addresses. The randomly generated addresses are automatically rotated when they reach a maximum lifetime. Again, this is done for security - but the device will still listen on it's former addresses in case a peer on the internet knows an old address (but not the new one).

On a Mac, you can see an address grid like this:

en0: flags=8863<UP,BROADCAST,SMART,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500
	ether 14:10:9f:d7:18:fb 
	inet6 fe80::1610:9fff:fed7:18fb%en0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x4 
	inet 192.168.2.30 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.2.255
	inet6 2605:6000:ed0a:f00:1610:9fff:fed7:18fb prefixlen 64 autoconf 
	inet6 2605:6000:ed0a:f00:1918:1efc:e71c:bf2d prefixlen 64 deprecated autoconf temporary 
	inet6 2605:6000:ed0a:f00:9068:7428:1beb:5c39 prefixlen 64 deprecated autoconf temporary 
	inet6 2605:6000:ed0a:f00:cd7a:dd40:6a73:f551 prefixlen 64 deprecated autoconf temporary 
	inet6 2605:6000:ed0a:f00:cc06:11b1:4c97:52b2 prefixlen 64 deprecated autoconf temporary 
	inet6 2605:6000:ed0a:f00:b5c7:15a7:5e1c:eb9c prefixlen 64 deprecated autoconf temporary 
	inet6 2605:6000:ed0a:f00:e0c2:a431:7457:cdc2 prefixlen 64 deprecated autoconf temporary 
	inet6 2605:6000:ed0a:f00:d9b3:6c23:9f24:d589 prefixlen 64 autoconf temporary 
	nd6 options=1<PERFORMNUD>
	media: autoselect
	status: active

All of the "temporary" IPv6 addresses are randomly generated address. All of the "deprecated" ones are old ones the device is no longer using but is remember in case it receives incoming connection attempts. The plain "autoconf" address (neither deprecated nor temporary) is, as you can see, based on the hardware MAC address is is basically never used for outgoing connections as a result.

[JeromeM]

Not sure if I'm missing something but these latest conversations seem very complicated/technical lol

I have been running my Ignite setup in Bridge Mode for 4 weeks now with my Google WiFi Router/AP's and have not had any issues. TV works on all 3 set top boxes, Netflix works great as well and IgniteTV app works I can watch live TV even when not at home (on the designated channels that allow this).

I moved my Modem to the demarc so that I could have Home Phone throughout the house as the installer took the lazy way out but everything works as it should. Got my bill with the install fees and additional costs of the service compared to what I have been paying and almost fell on the floor but that's the price to pay I guess. The convenience of just being able to move a box anywhere WiFi is available has already paid for itself.

[Datalink]

@JeromeM, what other XB6/Xi6 users are running into is the fact that the original combo works as it should when the XB6 modem is running in Dual Stack mode (IPV4 & IPV6).

When you bridge the XB6 and run your own router in Dual Stack mode, the Netflix app on the Xi6 does not work.  When you run the router in IPV4 mode only, the Netflix app works as it should. 

I had an ongoing conversation not too long ago, perhaps it was with you, where it was determined that the google routers did not have the necessary selection to run Native IPV6.  So by default, google routers are running IPV4 and as a result, the Xi6 stb works as it should, including the Netflix app.

[Smoothie]

Sounds like I'm in a similar situation to most here.

I have three xi5 boxes and an xb6 modem as well as a Google onhub tplink tgr1900.

Can I use the remote code sequence posted earlier, allowing me to change the wifi network on my xi5 boxes to the ssid of my Onhub? Then just turn off wif on the xb6?

Or should/can I change the default ssid on the xb6 to the same as my Onhub, then turn off wifi on my xb6, then put it into bridge mode?

Thanks!

[Datalink]

@Smoothie you should be able to use the code sequence as detailed in the following post to change the Xi6 wifi SSID and passphrase to your own SSID and passphrase:

http://communityforums.rogers.com/t5/TV/Rogers-Ignite-TV-Alternate-wifi-connection-possibilities/m-p...

Then you could simply turn off the XB6 wifi.  

The one point to keep in mind is that the XB6 will provide both IPV4 and IPV6 addresses to any connected devices whereas the Onhub looks like its only able to support IPV4 for its connected devices, which keeps the Xi6 stb satisfied. 

[Smoothie]

Thanks. Got to the wifi menu and selected my ssid. TV work but not Netflix.
I get a NW-2-4 error

Any ideas?

[Smoothie]

Never mind. Seem to work now. It just asked me to log into Netflix again.

Thanks!! No to update my other 2 boxes and turn off wifi on my Roger's modem.

[Datalink]

@Smoothie, when you change the wifi network that the Xi6 connects to, restart the Xi6, otherwise it will probably be looking for the previous IPV6 address that it was using, now unreachable thru the Onhub. The restart should probably flush the IPV6 address and force IPV4 (only) operation. 

[Fretty]

I've been struggling to get my IPTV boxes to work with my own router after setting the Rogers modem to bridge mode.  I have them connected and all that, no issues there.

I verified that my router has IPv6 disabled.

I have connected my IPTV boxes via wireless 5GHz.

YouTube works fine.

The guide works fine.

...but when I go to live TV it just goes black and then eventually gives me an error code.

I use a Netgear Nighthawk R7000 router if that helps.

ANY assistance would be most appreciated!

[big_nono]

Hello all. I've been thinking of signing up for ignite Tv. I do have a few concerns! I see some of you have been setting up your wifi via bridgd mode to your own personal routers, I trying to figure why. Is there a problem with the modem.thats offered?

[Biollw]

I am using the Arris VB6 as router but have the Wi-Fi shut off. ( all my X6i are hard wired ). Initially I had it in bridge mode and was using my own Netgear Nighthawk router. But rogers will not support the Ignite TV if you have bridged the Arris. My Netgear is setup as an access point, it has way better Wi-fi than the Arris and I control access to it.

I have no problem with the Arris, seems to be working just fine. I would prefer to see a logging of the network traffic in it but it is not there. Port forwarding seems to be working ok but my forwarding is simple.

People like their own control over their local network and/or have a more complex need than me. Some believe if using Arris as router than Rogers can peak into their local network. For the average user it works just fine.

Good Luck

PS: I really like the Ignite TV, very nicely done but could use a tweak or two.

[Biollw]

I initially used bridge mode with my nighthawk and had no problem. But changed it back to router/modem mode with wi-fi shut off.

Keep in mind Rogers will not support you if modem in bridge mode. Tech support was not happy with me when I had it that way.