Using the Ignite TV Modem/Gateway in Bridge Mode

[-G-]

There have been many questions in the Rogers Community Forums lately from users who have switched to Ignite TV and now wish to enable Bridge Mode on the Ignite modem/gateway and use Ignite TV with their own routers and Wi-Fi access points.  The Ignite TV service is actually pretty flexible and works great with a wide range of 3rd-party networking equipment.  That said, Rogers cannot troubleshoot problems or provide any level of support for these configurations so I'm creating this thread so that we, as a community, can support each other.

I recently posted some configuration tips for setting up your own router for use with the Ignite TV service and (time permitting) will post a more comprehensive step-by-step guide.  However, I still don't recommend using Ignite TV in any unsupported configuration unless you have moderately-advanced networking skills and can troubleshoot problems on your own.  Also, if any technical issues should arise, you need to be able to put your Ignite TV components back into their originally-installed supportable configuration before contacting Rogers for technical support.

*** Edited Labels *** 

[dougjp]

If as you say, I can run a phone cable from the XB6 to wherever I need to, can that be a 50 ft. cable plugged into the white phone junction box by the electrical panel in the basement, ie; the one that the current Rogers phone modem is plugged into and has all the little wires leading out to activate all the wall plugs in the house? I read somewhere that the wall plugs in the house can continue being used if the ignite modem is plugged in as described above, but no idea how close it has to be?

So far I can't solve how to switch to the Ignite bundle in my situation, which is land line phones plugged into various wall plugs around my 1,500 sq. ft. bungalow, Rogers phone modem in the basement at one end of the house, Rogers modem on the ground floor at the other end of the house, near my router which in turn, under Ignite, as to keep being used with hard wired ethernet into 2 desktop computers and a Powerline. To keep Rogers in Gateway mode, according to my Tp_Link Archer A10 access point setup (to keep Ignite TV reliable, get a useable pod extender where the signal is weak now, etc.), I have to keep the modem and router close in location and plugged together via an ethernet cable - if I'm reading their setup right?

[PVC]

Regarding IPv6, I have disabled mine and everything seems to be working properly.  Is there any specific reason to keep it on (using the XB6 in bridge mode to a router)?  I've read the benefits, and it seems outside of possibly better QOS rules/efficiency, it's not completely apparent to me why one would.

Plus, my R7000 doesn't really handle IPv6 as well as it does IPv4.  E.g., Seems to be much easier to block an IPv4 device as one can block access by IPv4 address.  But if that same device has both an IPv4 and IPv6 address, blocking the IPv4 doesn't block the device. 

Strangely found this out when my daughter could still use her ipad even though I had blocked the IPv4 it was connected to.  Oddly, she couldn't play Roblox after I blocked it, but could still access Youtube!?

[JWA1]

Everything in my home in respect of internet and TV is, and always has been, provided by Rogers.  So the fact that the set up that I have is not working properly (after  a Rogers tech set it up....I did nothing), is Rogers fault,   not mine.

And reading all the messaging around the topic of glitch Ignite TV service and other issues - and how to resolve them, is NOT conducive to the average customer to make the changes that might be needed to resolve the issues.   You have to be a true techie to be able to follow the suggestions without messing things up further.

And the Rogers support info is wholly insufficient to assist.  Where are there videos clearly showing what to do and what not to do?  Where to locate controls to make system changes?  Which changes you can make without making things worse and/or resulting in fees from Rogers to come fix it?    

The Ignite TV service has many great features that the traditional cable set up does not.  However......the traditional cable set up had one distinct advantage:  absent a system wide Rogers failure (rare and understandable when it does),  the cable set up ALWAYS WORKED PROPERLY.   Ignite TV seems to be a crapshoot that has many dependencies for smooth operation.  And such dependencies seemed to be left to the good or bad luck that an individual customer may have in terms of whether ones specific home set up will or will not result in optimal,  customer-friendly performance.

Not happy.

[Jtrflash]

Hi , well using the router part of the rogers ignite modem didn't work out. Constantly dropping IP address from devices. Device would go missing, although the device said it had a good signal and connectivity it didn't. The devices would go into a weird state. For example set up a wifi connection to my Pioneer Amp all good and tested, I could see it with my Pioneer App, sometime later gone. I changed back to my Linksys router, wow a big difference much more stable, no problems in days. One thing though the Rogers wifi signal is much stronger than the Linksys Router. I set the rogers modem into bridge mode, everything is fine but I can no longer connect to the rogers hub, this was not mentioned in any rogers article, in fact to turn it back onto use the same address 10.0.0.1 login in and enable it. The rogers modem can no longer be connected to. Now thinking about this I did turn off the wifi but no where does rogers mention you would no longer be able to connect. I imagine I should be able to open the config app if I connect an ethernet cable or completely reset the box. Jim

[Fookaroo]

I have my rogers modem in bridge mode as well, and most of the time i can't reach it by 10.0.0.1 at all. Once in a blue moon, it will actually work though without me changing anything, not that i really need to access anything on the gateway anyways.

[-G-]

I have "Bridge Mode" enabled on my XB6 and assign 192.168.x.x IPv4 addresses on my internal LAN.  I can still connect to http://10.0.0.1 and log into my XB6 without any problems.

[Fookaroo]

yup i am the same, xb6 is in bridge, my linksys router is giving out 192.168.x.x and also IPV6 addresses, 99% of the time, i can't reach the xb6

[PVC]

I agree @JWA1 .  Have been on Rogers Ignite now for weeks coming from 1Gig digital cable.  Has been the worse decision I've ever made.  I'm not a super advanced user, but I did have a great set up with a couple switches, 3 wired EAP225v3 access points and my R7000 in bridge mode (now with DD-WRT) and was getting great wireless throughout the house, with few drops.  Having cable and internet separate from each other also helped.  If cable was down, internet still worked, and vice versa.

For the past few weeks, I've been trouble shooting almost daily trying to figure out why my speeds are < 10Gbps, or suddenly nothing connects and I can't get internet access; or one of my radios connects but not the other (e.g., 5ghz connects fine, but 2.4 doesnt).  Last night my TV worked fine in my family room, but my upstairs box just wouldn't connect (despite an AP being in the same room).

Prior to this I was getting 150 to 200 down on 5ghz and 50-100 down on 2.4 almost consistently, with maybe a problem once a month that was resolved with a reboot most of the time.  Now, it's a mess, which when you WFH is all the more amplified.

Rogers techs will simply say "it's fine at the modem end so must be something else on your network".  They're 100% right of course.  But the ONLY change to my network was replacing the Hitron with the XB6.  So it would seem the XB6 simply doesn't play as nicely as the Hitron with access points and such. 

Frustrating for sure.

[RogersMike]

Hello @PVC 

I can understand the importance of having a stable and consistent internet service. 

Sound like you're having home network issues with your 3rd party network components. For testing purposes can you disconnect all the network switches, access points, and router out of the equation and see if that helped?

In the event you encounter any connectivity issues, the first thing I'd check is to see if there are any reported outages in the area via Rogers Service Interruptions board to see major outages that are currently ongoing.

If you are still experiencing issues, please send a private message to @CommunityHelps so we can get started.

Not familiar with our private messaging system? No worries, click here.

Kind Regards,

RogersMike

[ab54]

My experience, in case this helps anyone else

I was using the Rogers Advanced Wifi modem, with wifi turned off, serving only to provide internet access for my own router.  I wanted to be able to retain use of my own router with the Ignite Wifi gateway.

How to do everything that follows is explained in several posts by others, so is not repeated here.

After initial setup (that the very pleasant and helpful Rogers tech said could only be done via the Ignite phone app), I did everything else via the Wifi Gateway's web page,   starting with a wired ethernet connection and later over wifi.

Was not able to get the Ignite TV box to work over a wired connection to the Wifi gateway, so connected it over wifi in the 5 Ghz band.  Turned off the 2.4 Ghz band at the wifi gateway, but all that did was hide the SSID while the gateway kept broadcasting at the same signal strength on the channel I had assigned to it.   It does the same thing on the 5Ghz band if you turn that off too.

Plugged my own router (running DD-WRT) into one of the Wifi gateway ethernet ports.  It could not connect to the internet until IPV6 was turned on, and then worked fine.  No need to enable bridging mode on the Ignite Wifi gateway.  With bridging off the Ignite TV box works fine over wifi, and my ethernet connected router with IPV6 active does as well.  Set the Ignite Wifi gateway 5Ghz channel far away from the channel used by my own router, so there is no interference.  As an experiment I connected a router we sometimes use when travelling to the Ignite Wifi gateway.  It too could not connect to the internet until IPV6 was turned on, and then worked fine.

Our phone service is via a Vonage VOIP adapter, plugged into the second Ignite Wifi gateway ethernet port.  It just worked, no configuration needed.

The Ignite Wifi gateway generates enough heat to keep the small fan running all the time.  It is just loud enough to be annoying with the TV off.  So I moved it to the basement beside the power panel where the Rogers cable enters the house.  The Ignite TV box on the main floor is 15-20 feet away and continues to work fine.  We also have a Roku Premiere streaming device.  It too is connected to the Ignite wifi gateway 5 GHz Band, and works without any other configuration.

[RogersYasmine]

Hey @ab54,

Thanks for being a part of our community and awesome first post! 😊

We really appreciate you sharing your experience. I'm sure many folks will definitely find your post helpful when setting up their own configurations at home!

Cheers!

RogersLaura

[ColdGranite]

Re phone cable... if you haven't received an answer yet...

I simply disconnected the original Bell wire where it comes into the house.  

Then plugged the XB6 "TEL 1"  jack into the nearest phone jack in the wall. About 20 feet of standard 2-ended telephone wire.

Voila.  All 7 other phone jacks in the house are active.

Even an old Rotary phone, plugged into one of the jacks, gets a dial tone, and can dial out!!!!

[dougjp]

@ColdGranite , THANKS so much for your posts! I've been looking around here (and talking to Rogers, getting conflicting information) for months about how to make conventional phones plugged into wall jacks work with only one modem located far away from the electrical panel/junction box.

Up until this, I was told I either had to locate the single modem by the electrical panel, effectively eliminating being able to hard wire the modem to my router, or basically throw away all the phones and buy a many multiple handset telephone system. The only glimmer of hope was when I talked to a Rogers installer who said just plugging the modem into the nearest wall jack "should" work to get all jacks active, as you said, however it might not. Then he said if it doesn't, they could wire back to the junction box if the house layout made that possible.

On the issue of the modem left in Gateway mode with my router connected, I asked my router Tech support " Can two wifi systems co-exist in the house, the Rogers one and my router's?" The answer may not be helpful for all makes and models of routers, or detailed enough, eg: exactly what settings need to be changed, and on what.

They said " Your modem is working in gateway mode, the Archer A10 working in Router mode.

In this situation, the modem and Archer A10 can work together, and the DHCP function is enabled on Archer A10 and modem, this can coexist, there may be a little impact, which can be ignored (Since there are two wifi at home, the wifi channel may be a bit crowded, you can manually set the two wifi to different channels to solve it).

In this situation, there will be two Wi-Fi in your house, and the devices connecting to the modem Wi-Fi and the devices connecting to the Archer A10 Wi-Fi cannot access each other because they are in different LANs, which means there are two different Wi-Fi in your house. 

Whether Archer A10 is in router mode or access point mode, it must be wired connect to the modem to work. "

My question is, is this accurate, and if so, how to discover which channel each defaults to, and what to change to.

[ColdGranite]

Well their policies do change quickly.   

A week before I switched, their phone offer was essentially $0 with the bundle, but now its $10 🙂

On the phone lines... the important thing is to disconnect (or cut) the line from outside the building, leaving all other connections intact.

[ab54]

It looks accurate, and is essentially what I described having done in post #157. 

How to discover channels....

One way is to log into the gateway and router admin pages and see what the channels are (probably on auto), then switch them to manual and pick channel numbers far apart.

A better way is to first run a wifi scanner (Wifi scanner or Netspot Windows 10 apps, or Inssider) to look at the channels being broadcast.  For the Ignite Wifi gateway this will show that it continues broadcasting on channels even after wifi is turned off...........so you still have to go to the gateway and router admin pages and move the channels manually. Doing it this way, you also have the opportunity to avoid the broadcast channels of any nearby neighbors.

[dougjp]

Great info, thanks. I'm already on a version of Rogers home phone, so I likely won't have to change any wiring from the outside (or inside).

I deleted my comment about rebates from my previous post, as there may be too many variables to suggest unequal treatment, ie; different types of boxes, or local incentives to force people off an existing system they plan to shut down.

[ColdGranite]

FWIW, I bridged the IGNITE Gateway to my network today, and it was relatively painless.  Sharing my experience.

So far, working fine.

The router is a Linksys EA6400, with a Linksys RE7000 extender

I reset the gateway's IP to 192.168.0.1, so I could use 192.168.1.1 for my router.

Set the gateway to bridge, powered up the Linksys, and connected the bridge cable. 

One tv box was plugged in hardwired to the Linksys, and worked right away.

The wifi on the linksys was set to the same SSID and password for both 5 and 2.4g.  The wifi on the Extender was set to "same as router"... so essential there are 4 channels in the house all with the same SSID and password... 2.4 and 5 on the main router, and 2.4 and 5 on the extender. 

The two TV boxes on wifi were rebooted as follows:   Hold Rogers for 3 seconds, down, down, 4 , then hold "OK" for 5 seconds.  When they come up after the reboot, they go "connecting to your entertainment" for a long time... 5 minutes or so, searching for their old connection.. but after the 5 minutes they give up and ask you to enter the wifi SSID and password.  

Once that is done, the Ignite TV is working.  One of the boxes connected through the extender, the other one directly to the router.

All your other WIFI devices will have to forget the old network and be reconnected to the new one.  

It appears that they simply access the best signal for the SSID... if the device goes to another part of the house, the signal may get dropped and it just retries with the same SSID and password and finds the extender.

Its only been one day, but seems to be working fine.  

[ColdGranite]

Just a few things to add after a few days of bridge operation...

The Linksys EA6400 has a "prioritization" mode whereby one or more devices can be set to have "priority".  I was giving two devices "priority"...the extender and my NAS .

"Prioritization" has to be DISABLED... otherwise the Linksys DOWNLOAD speed drops drastically... like to 10mbps.

With it disabled, I am getting about 300 in the Rogers speed test.  I tested this both with the Rogers Speedtest site, and by timing a 1 gByte download.  Consistent results... 16 minutes vs 25 seconds. Definitely an issue.

After the bridge is up and running... and after any reboot of the gateway, router, or extender.... make sure you reboot the wireless TV Boxes.  We were getting frequent freezes, and it is possible that the TV box locked onto one of the weaker signals as the router/extender were coming back up. 

That all cleared up after a reboot of the boxes.... After everything is up and stable, the reboot of the TV Box probably got it to lock onto the strongest signal at its location.

After those adjustments, Bridge mode has been working fine.

[dougjp]

Thanks again. For a non techie like me, having seen the second power outage in a week, yet having no problems with my digital (not ignite bundle) afterward with all my devices, is there a need for bridge mode at all in a basic setup with only a personal router connected to the modem being different?

Ref my post # 160, second last paragraph quoting from my router tech support, which says it should be OK, but they don't know the Ignite system. If I simply plugged my router into the modem (in its default gateway mode), then changed the wifi channels on only my router to something else, sort of like what ab54 said in the previous page, would everything work? Because its likely after a power outage the TV boxes would connect only to the Ignite WiFi after a reboot if gateway mode is retained? 

[-G-]

@dougjp  If you are a non-techie, then I would strongly advise using a standard, Roger-supported configuration at first.  Do not make your life any more difficult than it needs to be, and do not create a potential support nightmare for yourself.  Configure the Ignite gateway with the same WiFi SSID and passphrase as what you had on your old router, then turn your old router off.  Your devices will then connect to the Ignite gateway.

On the other hand, if you know that you will run into problems (e.g. you have WiFi clients that are incompatible with band steering) then you should look at alternate solutions in advance.

[ColdGranite]

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@dougjp wrote:

Thanks again. For a non techie like me, having seen the second power outage in a week, yet having no problems with my digital (not ignite bundle) afterward with all my devices, is there a need for bridge mode at all in a basic setup with only a personal router connected to the modem being different?

Ref my post # 160, second last paragraph quoting from my router tech support, which says it should be OK, but they don't know the Ignite system. If I simply plugged my router into the modem (in its default gateway mode), then changed the wifi channels on only my router to something else, sort of like what ab54 said in the previous page, would everything work? Because its likely after a power outage the TV boxes would connect only to the Ignite WiFi after a reboot if gateway mode is retained? 

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Yes, in a basic setup there is no need for bridge mode... or even for having a personal router at all...

Unless you need more than two hardwired devices... because that is all the jacks that the Rogers gateway has.

If two is enough, then you could configure all your WIRELESS devices to talk to the wireless SSID of the Rogers gateway, and away you go.

As for running the Rogers Gateway, and your own router together, with both having their wireless operating...

... I have not tried that setup, but I can't see a reason that it would not work.  

However, since the TV Boxes will talk happily to your PERSONAL router, the only possible reason for running the gateway wireless AS WELL, is because you thing it gives better coverage. 

If I WAS to test this, it would go something like this:

1. Power down all the TV boxes

2.  power up the Rogers gateway, and power DOWN the personal router.

3.  plug a pc into the Rogers gateway, log into it, and configure the wireless to the SSID and network password that you want... note that the SSID and password can be the same for both 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz, and I recommend it.

4.  Power up the personal router, and plug the PC into a device port. Log in to the PERSONAL router, and configure the wireless SSID and password on it.  If it was me, I would use a different SSID that the Gateway.  But again, I would make the SSID / password the same for both 2.4 and 5 gHZ.

5.  Connect the personal router's "network" port to one of the Gateways internet ports.  At this point a browser should be able to access the world.

6.  boot up the tv boxes.  The wifi ones will take a long time ( 5 minutes or more) trying to connect to a network.  they will give up and ask you for network information.  That would the the GATEWAY's SSID and password.

7. all other devices would be configured to your PERSONAL router's SSID and password, so that they could have access to your home network.

Remember, I have not actually done this, but that's how I would try it.  If you need more information on any particular step, I can try to help