Do you switch your broadband router off when out for the day ?

victor2

TOP_CAT said:

Does it really matter if you switch your router off then when back home switch it back on along with everything else  .

Plusnet advise leaving the broadband router on  .

I cant see the point if your out for 8 -16 hours a day I tend to switch most things off except the fridge .

If you have any devices that work over WiFi, such as security cameras, they won't do their job when the router is off.

I have a virgin router in modem only mode, plus a wireless router that actually provides decent WiFi. Together they draw about 24 watts. Not a huge amount, but it does add up over the year.

MorningcoffeeIV

TOP_CAT said:

I suspect its the providers that dont want you switching the router off and on as its best for them.

It's best for all parties as it cuts down on 'faults' and broken routers and the inevitable customer service complaints.

brewerdave

Certainly with older ADSL routers, the main issue was not the router failing, but its power supply if you switched it on and off too often.. I has at least two failures of this nature in the past.
Not sure whether modern routers are equipped with more robust power bricks - but I suspect not !

Ozzig

It's up to you if you want to switch it off.

As per previous comments, updates are usually deployed overnight, you may miss an update altogether or have it apply and restart the router whilst you're on your mid-morning work call.

When the routers restart they negotiate signals and stuff, so you may receive a different quality of service than the day before.

If devices are constantly going on / off line their upstream device may flag it as a potential issue with the port it connects to, which in turn may begin to alter parameters to "fix" the problem resulting in degraded service as it starts to dial things down to try and improve the connectivity.

The components of the router and PSU will constantly be heating and cooling when they are designed to run constantly at a relatively consistent temperature.

Chances are they will just replace it if fails due to this because it's more expensive to establish the cause of the fault, it will cost you nothing beyond a day or so without broadband. 

In the 70s before we went off to Brid, my dad always unplugged every electrical device and also the telly aerial - we never had one lightning strike to the house because of this.

victor2

Ozzig said:

It's up to you if you want to switch it off.

As per previous comments, updates are usually deployed overnight, you may miss an update altogether or have it apply and restart the router whilst you're on your mid-morning work call.

When the routers restart they negotiate signals and stuff, so you may receive a different quality of service than the day before.

If devices are constantly going on / off line their upstream device may flag it as a potential issue with the port it connects to, which in turn may begin to alter parameters to "fix" the problem resulting in degraded service as it starts to dial things down to try and improve the connectivity.

The components of the router and PSU will constantly be heating and cooling when they are designed to run constantly at a relatively consistent temperature.

Chances are they will just replace it if fails due to this because it's more expensive to establish the cause of the fault, it will cost you nothing beyond a day or so without broadband. 

In the 70s before we went off to Brid, my dad always unplugged every electrical device and also the telly aerial - we never had one lightning strike to the house because of this.

I've never had a house struck by lightning, and I don't know anyone who has. Don't know anyone who unplugs every electrical device at night either. 
Where's Brid?

Ozzig

victor2 said:
Where's Brid?

The beautiful east coast of Yorkshire.

TOP_CAT

"Don't know anyone who unplugs every electrical device at night either. " 

Around W11 london you might find a different view point on that 

MattMattMattUK

TOP_CAT said:

I suspect its the providers that dont want you switching the router off and on as its best for them but of course you can do whatever .
After the heatwave last summer with way over 40 degrees inside I still switch the broadband and TV off at the wall .
Doing so didnt seem to matter much then or now ...... with the exception of ranting mse posters of course .

Genuinely what are you hoping to achieve by turning it off? If it is to stop heat emissions the router is emitting around 0.35 kWh a day, for comparison the average human at rest emits around 2.4kWh per day, boiling the kettle with one mug's worth of water in will generate around 0.1kWh of heat, the heat from the sun getting through the windows will produce upwards of 10kWh and in a property with a lot of south facing windows the thermal load could easily be upwards of 50kWh per day.

Qyburn

wongataa said:

Qyburn said:

Switching off won't slow the connection. The threshold for DLM is 10 or so retrains per day,  and they don't count unless the drop and retrain fall in the same 15 minute interval. Hence the advice to leave it off or disconnected for at least 15 minutes if you dont want risk upsetting the service.

I have seen it happen with ADSL.  It won't always happen but it can.

What sort of effect did you see, change in Noise Margin, Interleaving, or was it a banding?  None of these should remotely be applied as a result of one disconnection/reconnection.

There's a good write up on DLM for both ADSL and VDSL here ..

https://kitz.co.uk/adsl/DLM.htm

It lists the thresholds for intervention in terms of retrains (MTBR) and errors, and provides a bit of clarity about what sort of retrain even counts ..

"The DLM only counts 'forced' retrains and will disregard any resyncs detected as being an Unforced Retrain or one caused by a Wide Area Event.

An unforced retrain is one in which the user switches off or unplugs their modem for "a period of time greater than the minimum period of time" and that a minimum period of time prior to or after a resynchronisation has elapsed without the line automatically attempting, but failing to establish a connection.

Because we know that the DLM collects data bins every 15 mins and that it monitors traffic count to see if the line is in use, it is therefore recommended if possible to try to leave the router switched off for 30 mins to ensure that the DLM sees at least one complete period of inactivity prior to the resync. "

onomatopoeia99

TOP_CAT said:

Does it really matter if you switch your router off then when back home switch it back on along with everything else  .

Plusnet advise leaving the broadband router on  .

I cant see the point if your out for 8 -16 hours a day I tend to switch most things off except the fridge .

If I turned my router off I'd lose my email, so I don't turn it off, ever, even when I go on holiday.  It only comes down for upgrades that require a reboot, and I have a UPS that ensures that a mains blip won't bring it down either.