Weak Connection

[brownel02]

I have a split level home of roughly 2700sf.  My nearest neighbor is about 1/2 mile away.  No new services/devices have been added to my house although 1 wall was removed to create a more open concept.  My services come into the basement (power, cable, internet...).

Case 1: For the past 3 years I have had my 1st Google Wifi set up in the basement attached to my router.  My 2nd point is in my dining room (1 room and 1 floor away), 3rd point is in the living room (2 rooms away but within eye sight, no walls).  

I started having internet issues about 3 months ago (weak connection, dropped service, tv (in living room) buffering.  All speed tests show 450+Mbps and all connecting lines are CAT6.  I followed these instructions (they have been given multiple times on this forum): 

*Do a full power cycle of the network - this will allow the entire network to re-establish connections. Here's how to do it properly.

• Disconnect the power cable and Ethernet cable from the Google Nest Wifi router.
• Disconnect the power cables from the other Wifi points.
• Disconnect the power cable from the modem.
• Allow the power to stay disconnected from all for 5 minutes.
• Connect the power back to the modem only and wait for it to fully boot back up.
• All lights should be lit up before moving to the next step.
• After the modem is back online, connect the Ethernet cable to back to the Google Nest Wifi router's WAN port (globe symbol).
• Connect the power cable back to Google Nest Wifi router and to other Wifi points.
• Allow the all Wifi points to be fully back on.

These instructions made no difference to the signal quality, still showing as Weak on both of my wifi points.  

Case 2: I moved my Main Google Wifi to the 1st floor running new CAT6 back to my router (30').  My 2nd wifi spot is now in the living room (eye sight to the main Google wifi modem) but the signal still shows as a Weak connection. No 3rd wifi puck is currently installed.   

Any help on getting my service back to stable before I ditch these pucks?

Thanks

[Bdey13024]

I am experiencing the same problem as everyone else. My pucks are weak connection no matter where they are in the house. I have a hub with 3 pucks over 2200 sq ft. Not only is the connection weak but the pucks are constantly offline and need to be reset. 

[JanosX]

Yep.  Offline is getting more and more frequent.  I am doing the full power cycle (power everything off then power back on 1 by 1, starting with the router) 2 or 3 times a day.  I send feedback through the home app everytime they are weak or offline. 

I have even been on with support and all I got was checking upstream problems.  As if a DNS issue would hurt my wifi, but not my wired network (all run through the Google router).  Support is stumped and just walk me through the motions until they get me to a point where I have to "monitor for the next 24 to 48 hours". Well they got me off the phone, but that's all that 2 hours accomplished.

Do you know how much I love wasting $500 on a product that makes my other 15+ Google/Nest devices (cameras, doorbells, displays, speakers and Chromecast) completely useless 3 times a day.  ZERO

I get that products can glitch, fine.  But do something.  As far as I can tell the firmware is 5 or 6 months old.  On top of no fixes for half a year I haven't heard Google even acknowledge the issue.  

I get you're big Google, but you have to do better!

[imbarr]

How has there been no answer to this topic for a fix in months. Google this is ridiculous for a company of your size

[JanosX]

Well after months of no action I pulled the trigger and bought a TP-Link X60.  I spent less than the I did with the Nest Wifi, and now have wifi 6 and ridiculously stable and fast wifi.  I literally doubled my wifi speed... And I went from 3 points down to 2.  I still wasted the $500 on the Nest system, so I can promise you I will eventually switch out all of my google speakers, displays and cameras after this.  6 months of a faulty firmware and ZERO action.  I bought into the Google infrastructure (literally) and will now leave it... Fully.  Bye Google.

[Parkerem123]

Literally got the google nest with 3 WiFi points 3 days ago... worked well for one day... now all connections are weak.. what a rip... Obviously they have no idea

[mi5key]

Return it while you can.

[Clutch]

Imagine Google having a thread with multiple people that are having the same exact problem but no fix yet. 

[navkat25]

I think they don’t care as it is working when we restart the network 

[malcyl]

I have been suffering from this as well.

This may not be the case for everyone here, but I have found a solution that has worked for me. 

I have three access points roughly in a line to get from the front to the back of my property. Only one access point has a wired connection - the one working as the router at the front of my property. The access point in the middle of my property has always been fine, but the one at the back changed from a good connection to a weak one. 

When the middle access point was off for some reason, I was expecting the one at the back of the property to loose connection. It didn't - it had the same weak connection.

I realised that the access point was connecting from the very back of my property, to the router access point at the front. 

Restarting my network, it temporarily connected to the middle access point but before long would revert back to a weak connection, accessing the router much further away.

Following suggestions earlier on this thread, I disabled cloud services and the preferred services I had. After restarting again, the access point at the back of my property has maintained a good connection via the middle access point.

This suggests to me, that with cloud services and preferred services turned on, access points are trying to connect to the router, even with a poor signal, rather than a closer access point.

This might not be the solution for everyone, but I thought I would share it as it has significantly improved things for me. 

[navkat25]

Hello ,

How did you turn off the cloud services ? 

[malcyl]

You can enable/disable them in the Google home app. In the WiFi section, then in the privacy settings. 

[navkat25]

thx a lot 

[unhuman]

Just started yesterday...  So bad.

[jpl1204]

If you use Twitter go to @madebygoogle. Screen shot your weak connection/offline and send @madebygoogle a private message. @madebygoogle responded quickly and is aware of the weak connection issues. @madebygoogle had me screenshot testwifi.here/api/v1/status and send a screenshot back to @madebygoogle. @madebygoogle then provided instructions for changing DNS to custom and turning Nest WiFi services off and back on. @madebygoogle asked me to monitor  the connection and @madebygoogle advised they would check back in a couple of days. I did not save the custom correctly the first time so I cannot provide any results at this time. I need another 24 hrs before I can confirm the fix worked. 

[Chip32]

With no response, I'm going to guess this didn't work.

[DeboraLG]

Almost the same issue! My main point is directly wired, and the second one is only 10 ft away with absolutely nothing in between them, yet shows a week strength. My third one is in the bedroom around the other side of the house and also shows as week, which isn't all that surprising considering all of the walls in between. But the first set makes no sense at all to me.

[Nyg]

This is kind of a joke. I've been following this forum for months, thinking it would get fixed/addressed? Just called Google to return the terrible device, and they're now saying we shouldn't consult these forums at all. 

Has me begging why they would pay a community specialist to come into these threads, and not advise that?

I own close to 50 google products, and this experience has me thinking I'll completely abandon the ecosystem. Sure working with a megalith with flashy tech is fun, but when you realize they literally give no care whatsoever to their client experience, it has me realizing what a waste of money it all was

[mi5key]

Well, going to call BS on that.  Google phone support told me I had no problem after many calls/tickets.  Yet, I had a significant problem and couldn't use my Nest WiFi.  It's sitting in its own box in my closet, waiting for a fix.  Had to buy a TP-Link wifi router to get wifi back in the house.

Google support doesn't appear to be acknowledging the problem yet.  My guess is that we're running into level 1 support who is reading scripts.  Officially, tech support must say to disregard these forums because it's not official support.  Apple does the same thing on their community support forums.

[guyguy]

Yup they gave me the run around for weeks, do this, try this. Same **bleep** every call, and even after explaining that all of this does not work cause I have tried it 15 times, they would say the same **bleep**. Got rid of them months ago. AmpliFi HD for the win. I still have google products that I have spent a lot of money on, very disheartening they can’t own the issue and tell their customers that, rather beat around the bush. Unhappy customer here but hey they got my hard earned money! Right…..

[citizenleroy]

Same situation here. Had “great” connection on all devices and for the past 2 months it has changed to “weak” on all. They have not moved locations and I even swapped one with a brand new one. Still same issue… 😞 

[BusyBeeBee]

Same issue here: I got and installed a Google Nest Wifi router and one point three days ago. I had Great Connection for the first two days, and then on the third day until now the Point suddenly dropped to Weak Connection with no change.

I tried moving it closer, different angle, restarted it... No change. Preferred activities have always been off.

The router itself gets "Blazing fast" internet connection. But the Point gets "Weak Connection" no matter what I do... 

[Sarn]

Same issue here. Worked great for a few months and one non router point started showing weak signal. Placed it right next to the router and still showing weak signal. Going to take it back for warranty and replacing if not fixed soon.

[Sarn]

Spoke too soon. All showing great connection now. Unplugged main cord for modem. Unplugged main router. Unplugged WAP. One WAP remained plugged in. Replugged everything. Turned on modem. Ran test twice. Great connection on both WAPs now.

[Malycto]

How long does it stay good is the question. I restarted yesterday and by this morning it was junk again. It can go bad in an hour or it could go bad over the course of the day it always looks good and works well after a fresh start, at least for a while.

[peterf]

same. everything was great. now one says ‘weak’ connection. 

[Yauami]

Same issue for me. I’ve now reinstalled the wifi point to be in the same room and I still get a weak signal. 

[Malycto]

Despite the claim that a new firmware would be out, it's been 4 days and nothing has changed.

No change in performance, no change in the version numbers visible on the router or the access points.

[brownel02]

Regardless if a new version was sent out or not my latest numbers are staggering.  At my router (line in from my ISP) I am getting 458Mbps down, at the WIFI point I am getting 0.96Mbps down.  That is just awesome when trying to work from home, stream anything or just surf the web.  I should have listened to Jeff way back when he told me how to fix the wifi issue....just hardwire everything!!  That way there is no wifi issue.  🙄  1 Nest Hub and 1 access point within direct sight (but still showing weak connection) and the system drops wifi numerous times per day.  Totally unacceptable

[Jeff]

Here are the firmware numbers for reference. The current release (September 2021) is 13729.57.27. The new release (March 2021) is 14150.43.80. That's the same number for both Google and Nest WiFi routers.

Thanks.

[Malycto]

Is there no change expected on the version of the access point?

Is there a way to force the update?

[CheckForUpdate]

I still need the update.  I came to this forum a week ago when my WiFi started acting up.  I have tried restarting the network.  I really do not want to reset it to factory settings, but I guess I may have to go that route.  Could a failure to update when it was pushed have caused this network inconsistency?  Anyway to request an update be sent or resent?  I think not having an update check feature is a design flaw.  Users should know if their firmware is on the latest release without having to come here.  Decent release notes would be great to have too.

[CheckForUpdate]

I was right.  The Google Nest WiFi update failed and I had to factory reset my network in order to get the latest software on the router and points.  The mesh connectivity does not appear to have improved.  You move one point with a weak connection, retest mesh, and then the others show a weak connection.  There needs to be a real-time test you can turn on when diagnosing.  I wonder if other signals are interfering.  

[BusyBeeBee]

Good update: I eventually received the software update, and without even restarting or unplugging anything, things work very well everywhere in my house now! The Point just always shows Great Connection now. 

Thank you! 

[Malycto]

I finally got the update! I've turned all the features I had turned off before in hopes of improved performance. It's been about a week and no issues.

[peterf]

Finally got the update as well (what is it with Google’s really really long staggered updates). Works great again. Getting great/good signals from all points again. 

[Ross11]

How do we know if we have the updated version? I have a puck less than 10ft away saying 'Weak connection'

[Malycto]

You can look at device settings for the router and check the version.

The new version is 14150.43.80

[Ross11]

Odd, I have that version

[Malycto]

Anyone else who got the update have their network going back to crap again?

[crwmlw]

Yep, It seems I have the latest firmware/software and nothing has changed.