TP Link wireless router connects but web pages do not load

Question

I have recently purchased a TP-Link TL-WR740N but somehow it is not working properly.

I do not have an ISP connection, rather I have fixed IP connectivity so that I get a 100Mbps Ethernet cable coming for a switch with fixed static IP addresses. Previously I connected directly to my laptop and it was working perfectly.

With this new router, I setup everything, configured WAN settings and plugged the cable that I plugged to my laptop. It works but every time I open a webpage, it takes forever to open or might be some part of page loads and then it just hangs in a waiting state. Things do not change no matter how much I use it over wireless or secondary wired ports (LAN).

Are there some specific settings that I should change to make it work?

Considering I have IP connectivity at the backend, would that require some specific settings?

I searched Google and something tells me about MTU, but I'm not sure if I should look at it. Any suggestions?

Solution

Are you letting the router provide you with an IP address on the WiFi side (DHCP from the router)? If so, what is it setting the DNS address to on your laptop?

Even though the router itself may be set up to use Google's DNS, it may be setting the laptop to use the ROUTER as a DNS server and many cheap routers are not powerful enough to do this reliably.

If this is the case, simply change the routers settings to deliver Google DNS or OpenDNS servers instead of itself (if the router can do this) - if the router can't be configured that way, make the change in Windows.

It is unlikely to be an MTU issue as long as both the router and laptop are fairly new. To be honest though, I think that the only reliable way to prove this is to use Wireshark to monitor a round-trip conversation between your laptop and the Internet. You would need to know how to look for fragmented packets.

Comments

[Dave]

Are you able to ping out to 8.8.8.8? I don't understand what you mean by you don't have an ISP but a fixed IP. They are not the same - one is a provider, the other is an IP address. Do you mean you're on a fixed IP (and not static) because either way, your ISP should provide you details for your router.

[CharlieRB]

Were you using a static IP on the computer with the previous connection setup (prior to adding the router)?

[Sara]

@CharlieRB, i live in student hostel and they have their IP Backbone where we live, so they just give us a wired ethernet connection which is 100Mbps to their switch installed in our living area and internet is pretty fast on it around 90Mbit downlink 60Mbit uplink, but on this wireless router it just get too slow to never working situation

[Sara]

@DaveRook, yes ping works to google dns but sometime with large timeouts, while if i connect the same cable to my laptop, i get response less then 2ms

[Dave]

As per your note to CharlieRB, if this is your set up then you should really talk to your system administrator of the hostel as they could have all sorts of weird and wonderful things going on. I would guess this is going to be too hard to diagnose as we'd just be guessing. Also, there could be a problem with you using your own router maybe? Can you not plug direct from the switch into your PC?

[Sara]

@CharlieRB, every room has fixed public IP directly accessible from internet. it is fixed because they want to monitor may be

[Sara]

@DaveRook, thanks i will contact them but they are so lazy to respond quickly so i thought something here might help. It works with direct connection but they have binded mac with this fixed ip. And i wanted to use wifi on my phone as well and if i have guest on his/her laptop, which legally is not allowed. PS: i have cloned wiress router mac to the one which i had on my laptop and is registered with the network.