SAX1V1R Settings are Severely Limited
Just recently, my Spectrum technician swapped out my old leased router for a new SAX1V1R router. I didn't think much of it considering I had figured this router would have the same configuration capabilities as my old one, if not more since it is new. Well, I found out that Spectrum severely limits how much this router can be configured. You have to use the Spectrum app to configure it and the options are few compared to the old router I had. I am an IT Professional and would like the flexibility to have more advanced configuration settings, but there is no way to get to them on this router. If you try to navigate to the browser interface, it just tells you to use the Spectrum app, and as I said before, there are very limited options for router configuration on the Spectrum app. In fact, some of the options have very simplistic descriptions that don't go into much detail on what they do. For instance, the Security Shield info doesn't provide enough technical info for someone like myself to fully understand what it does exactly and doesn't provide any granularity on configuring it. It is either on or off. This is really unacceptable!
Best Answers
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Hello @kenv
Welcome to our community! I'm sorry to hear that our current routers do not meet your configuration needs. If you need greater control over the router, I would recommend purchasing your own router as you would have total control over the settings and configurations. This would also allow you to have the monthly wifi charge removed from your bill as well.
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Good morning @kenv,
You can find information on Security Shield here. I'm not showing activity related to security shield on a mobile device, and even then, it would not disconnect a connected device from the wifi network entirely. Within the wifi settings on your mobile device, is it set to switch to mobile data when that connection is better than the wifi connection? I see several instances where mobile devices are connected to the 5ghz network, but it shows poor signal strength. Is the device also set to automatically connect/reconnect to your home wifi network? When your router was changed, was the SSID & password set the same to the previous device, or are they different? If you didn't have to update the wifi information on your phone, it may help to forget the network and reconnect.
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I do agree if the problem didn't start until you got the new router it's unlikely to be a coincidence, but not that security shield is in any way the cause. Security shield won't disconnect you from WiFi, it just blocks suspicious websites, and it notifies you of its actions. It's not the same thing as a firewall. I definitely recommend forgetting and reconnecting to the network, or changing the SSID and password. If the issue persists, you can exchange the router but I highly recommend getting your own if you want more control over it.
To acknowledge your concern about us not resolving outages when using your own router; While we can't provide support for your router, which can cause some complications if you contact us with service issues through it, you can simply connect a device straight to the modem with an ethernet cable and then reboot the modem to see if any issues persists. If you do this and issues do persist, you will have absolutely no problems getting assistance from us fixing it.2
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The problem with using a personal router is that Spectrum isn't always receptive to getting outages fixed when a personal router is used. That's why I had stuck with using the leased router that Spectrum provides. This wasn't a problem with my past leased routers, but now that the new leased routers have these limitations, I may have to reconsider. Seems like it would be in Spectrum's best interest to be more accommodating on the newer routers to keep the lease going.
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Recently, my Spectrum router was replaced with a new SAX1V1R router. For some reason, every so often, the router disconnects my phone from wifi and then my phone automatically switches over to the cellular data network. This has become an issue because I typically assume that when I am home that my phone is on wifi, but there have been times when I am unknowingly consuming my limited data plan on my phone and running up data usage. Turns out that the router sometimes disconnects my phone from wifi. The only way to get it back is to cycle the wifi on my phone. This was never an issue with my old Spectrum router. I suspect it is related to Security Shield where maybe it sees traffic on my phone that it doesn't like. The other day I was uploading all my photos to Amazon Prime and wifi cut out during that process. I'm wondering what the ramifications would be if I turn off the Security Shield on the router. I tried turning it off and the problem doesn't seem to occur anymore. I am an IT professional and would like more details on what exactly Security Shield does. There are no granular configurations for Security Shield. It is either off or on. Can someone provide more info on what it does? If I turn it off, does it also disable the firewall on the router? It worries me that turning it off entirely may expose my network to unwanted security breaches. However, I really don't want my phone switching over to my cellular data plan when I am expecting it to not get dropped from my wifi network. I would be fine with just firewall port blocking on my network, but without knowing what Security Shield does, I am hesitant to leave it off. Any info on this would be greatly appreciated.
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It seems highly coincidental that this started happening once the new router was installed. I haven't changed any of my phone settings. The new router was configured with the same SSID and password that was on the previous router. The only difference I can think of is that the phone is connecting with WiFi 6, whereas previously that wasn't supported on the old router. But that shouldn't make any difference. Also, signal strength is good. The disconnect seems to occur under heavy traffic, such as video streaming while uploading, but not airways. The issue doesn't occur when Security Shield is turned off. That link you shared regarding Security Shield isn't very technically detailed. It's all in layman's terms. I'd like to know if turning it off disables the firewall.
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