Problems with XP SP3 & some routers

Dave from digitaldna.com.au reports the following:

A bit of feedback for you. I bought one of the 2820s off you just recently. I nearly ended up RA’ing it. I tried to access it using 3 different PCs/Laptops with IE7 and with Firefox and could not successfully browse to it. What made it particularly frustrating was that:

- I could ping it
- I could Telnet to it
- I could putty to it
- I could do a firmware upgrade to it ( I loaded it with 3G Beta)
- I could NMAP port scan it

I found an obscure Billion post that reckoned XP SP3 was playing havoc with Billion Routers. Guess what, XP SP3 plays havoc with Draytek routers as well and it also plays havoc with a Dlink DIR-451 I was trying to configure. All my 3 PCs/Laptops that I used were SP3.

Alas the remedy to these issues was not a very pleasant one. I had to use a Vista PC running IE7 (or Firefox) to configure the Draytek (and the DLINK) !! Draytek acknowledge that there is an issue with SP3 – it is a Microsoft issue obviously; they just need to nail down the details enough for Microsoft to HotFix it.

So, to all your customers, you may wish to warn them that XP SP3 does not play nicely with Billion, Draytek or Dlink routers!

BTW once I got the Draytek configured via Vista, the XP SP3 network behind it worked fine. I just can’t use SP3 to access it to configure it.

We are using a Vodafone 3G card as an interim measure for a client until their ADSL arrives – and it works really well – very easy to get up and going. Nice box that 2820.

Update: Latest feedback from Draytek is they can’t reproduce it in their labs. I could reproduce it no problems at all on 3 separate PCs.

3 Responses to “Problems with XP SP3 & some routers”

  1. Wayne says:

    Years ago I had a D-Link router exhibit similar web interface stalls with windows XP. Windows 2k wasn’t a problem. New firmware for the D-Link router resolved the interface lockup that was blamed on UPnP.

    Microsoft may have changed the UPnP integration routines. Can UPnP be turned off. If this is the problem does the router have problems with only one SP3 machine connected to the router when a Vista or other non intrusive machine is accessing the web interface?

  2. OzCableguy says:

    This just in from Billion

    - Urgent Firmware Notice – Billion BiPAC 5200G, 5200N

    The new Windows XP service pack 3 causes problems with the BIPAC 5200G and 5200N, and Billion has released new firmware to solve the conflict.

  3. Daniel says:

    I read similar article also named some routers, and it was completely different. Personally, I agree with you more, because this article makes a little bit more sense for me

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