Ignite from Legacy Questions

[ITDummie]

Finally forced to drop Legacy and go to Ignite internet, TV and home phone. Currently using an Asus RT-AX88U and the Hitron in bridge mode. The combination has been flawless. My plan is to continue to use the Asus Router. I have kept my home phone for personal reasons, live alone and if something happens to my mobile, calls can still be made. Now for the questions. There is a WAN port on the Ignite router which is supposedly used to connect third party routers to. That goes against what I know about routers and would prefer to have the Rogers Ignite modem in bridge mode. Will my home phone still work with the bridge mode? Doing a little research has come up with no straight answer. Next, the WiFi TV boxes. The Asus Router has been set for IPv6. Do I put the Ignite router into bridge mode before firing up the TV boxes? Next, how hard is to revert the Ignite router back to Gateway mode if my plan has problems? I am not very techy and sometimes attempting things gets me into trouble. Currently waiting for my stuff to arrive. Thanks.

*** Edited Labels ***

[RogersJermaine]

Hey @ITDummie,

Welcome to the Rogers Community Forums, and thank you for your very first post here! We do hope you are able to find all the answers to any inquiries you may have. Here are the answers to the questions you have currently presented.

"There is a WAN port on the Ignite router which is supposedly used to connect third party routers to. That goes against what I know about routers and would prefer to have the Rogers Ignite modem in bridge mode."

1. Depending on the Ignite Gateway modem you receive, the XB6 has 2 LAN ports, and the XB7 and XB8 have 4 LAN ports. Once the modem is in bridge mode, any of the LAN ports will work in bridge mode for you to connect your router. Typically, though, it is always preferred to use LAN port 1.

"Will my home phone still work with the bridge mode? Doing a little research has come up with no straight answer. "

2. Yes, you can bridge the Ignite Gateway modem to use your own router, and the Ignite Home Phone will still work.

"Next, the WiFi TV boxes. The Asus Router has been set for IPv6. Do I put the Ignite router into bridge mode before firing up the TV boxes? "

3. Our residential expert, @-G-, made this amazing post here, that you can also read up on about using your own router for the Ignite TV services.

"Next, how hard is to revert the Ignite router back to Gateway mode if my plan has problems? "

4. If you do need to re-enable Gateway mode on the modem, then you can follow the steps here to enable Gateway mode.
 

I hope this information helps! Let us know if you have any other questions.

RogersJermaine

[-G- · Accepted solution]

Thanks for responding, @RogersJermaine !

@ITDummie  When setting up your Ignite TV service, I would start by turning off your ASUS router and configure the Ignite Gateway with the same WiFi username/passphrase that you have configured in your RT-AX88U.  Once you do that, your Ignite set-top boxes will auto-connect to Wi-Fi when you turn them on.

Once you confirm that everything is working in a standard, Rogers-supported configuration, you can then switch over to the Bridge Mode configuration.  It's easiest to do this if you have an Ethernet-connected computer.

- Power off your Ignite set-top boxes

- Connect your computer by Ethernet to the Ignite Gateway

- Log into the Ignite Gateway, disable Wi-Fi, then log out.

- Disconnect your computer and connect your ASUS router by Ethernet to the gateway

- Connect your computer to your ASUS router.  (At this point, you can use Ethernet or Wi-Fi)

- Log into the Ignite Gateway again and enable Bridge Mode

- Wait a few minutes for the Ignite Gateway to come online, then reboot your ASUS router

- Confirm that your ASUS router has obtained a public IP address (not a 10.0.0.x address)

- Test your IPv4 and IPv6 Internet connectivity: https://test-ipv6.com

- If everything looks good, power up your Ignite set-top boxes.  They should connect to your router's Wi-Fi.

If you should ever need to revert back to the Rogers-supported config, log into the Ignite Gateway (you should still be able to do this while in Bridge Mode), disable Bridge Mode (the Ignite Gateway should reboot in "gateway" mode with Wi-Fi enabled), then power-off your ASUS router.

When you are done, go back to your "Bridge Mode" configuration using the same steps as before.

[ITDummie]

Thanks for your help. Everything is up and running. When the Gateway was registered it was immediately put into bridge mode. Since the Asus was previously setup up for IPv6, the TV boxes were setup. I used the 9434 on the remote and scrolled to the bottom and used WPS. Made it simple. Telephone works. I did have one minor issue. After confirming bridge mode the Ignite Router would not connect to Rogers or be found with the address connect to a PC and ethernet cable. After about 20mins the power was disconnected and reconnected. It went better than expected.

[-G-]

@ITDummie  There's one little quirk/feature that you need to be mindful of: When an Ignite set-top box loses network connectivity, it contacts a service on the Ignite Gateway over Wi-Fi through a special hidden SSID to obtain new Wi-Fi credentials, even while the Gateway is running in Bridge Mode.  If you don't have the Ignite Gateway's internal Wi-Fi network configured with the same credentials as your own router's Wi-Fi, the set-top boxes will obtain an unusable Wi-Fi network name and passphrase from the Gateway and will not reconnect to your router's Wi-Fi network.  You may also find the set-top boxes randomly dropping off of Wi-Fi.