Internet Connection Reset on the Speedport W 722V (Type B)
Hi!
Since I've recently found out that my new router, the T-Home Speedport W 722V Type B, apparently does not support automatic disconnecting at a specific time (in order to circumvent the 24-hour connectionreset by my ISP), I took a route that my good friend Pool has been using for quite some time.
It is a batch script, so in order to use it, you have to be able to execute it.
On a side note, the Type A model of this router does support automatic disconnecting! Make sure you choose "Other provider" when you're in the internet configuration menu in order to be able to see the setting for that. The "T-Online" option sadly does not show it.
What you need:
- A Windows machine that is running at the given time (has to execute the script)
- cURL for Windows, preferably the win32-ssl-sspi version (download page). win32-ssl should be fine as well.
- Configure a scheduled task for the script, which is not covered in this guide (but quite simple. Just make it execute the script.)
The batch script:
REM Speedport W 722V Type B Internet Reset Script v1.0 - 2010-04-29 REM Written by pl (plee.me) REM REM Works with the T-Home Speedport W 722V Type B home router. REM START CONFIGURATION REM Adjust these variables to your own ones! SET PWD=12345678 SET COOKIEFILE="routercookies.txt" REM END OF CONFIGURATION @echo off curl -k https://speedport.ip/cgi-bin/login.cgi -d "pws=%PWD%" -e "https://speedport.ip/hcti_start_passwort.stm" -c "%COOKIEFILE%" curl -k https://speedport.ip/cgi-bin/status_startseite.cgi -d "connect=0&disconnect=1&block=0&nonblock=0&abc=0" -e "https://speedport.ip/hcti_startseite.stm" -b "%COOKIEFILE%" curl -k https://speedport.ip/cgi-bin/status_startseite.cgi -d "connect=1&disconnect=0&block=0&nonblock=0&abc=0" -e "https://speedport.ip/hcti_startseite.stm" -b "%COOKIEFILE%" curl -k https://speedport.ip/cgi-bin/logoutall.cgi -e "https://speedport.ip/hcti_startseite.stm" -b "%COOKIEFILE%" del "%COOKIEFILE%"
What this script does:
It logs on the web administration interface, uses a hidden option to disconnect the internet connection, then uses a hidden option to connect, and finally logs out again.
Because the cookie is cached in a text file, it is deleted at the end of the script.
Additional information:
The lines beginning with REM are comments, so you might as well leave them out.
If you run the script, make sure that you either have the cURL directory in the PATH environment variable, or that you set its folder as the working directory, so that it can find the curl.exe and actually execute the (central) steps of the script.
I'm sure that this script can be optimized (probably a lot), but for now, it's doing the job.
I hope that was of any help to you, and thanks for reading! 
Asus P5B and the broken JMicron SATA/PATA controller
Hey there!
Yesterday, while I was trying out my new hard drive, I noticed that it apparently took ages to defragment. Not only that, but it also took away a major amount of resources. Funnily enough, the CPU usage didn't show up at all in the task manager (I'm using Windows XP x64 Professional). However, the mouse cursor was lagging behind and whenever I played audio or video - be it a YouTube video or an actual video in VLC - it lagged there as well.
So what could it be?
(Skip to the bottom to see the conclusion )
My first guess was that there was a hardware failure. Probably with the new hard drive because my others all worked, right? Technically it was unlike for my new hard drive to be damaged though as I formatted it the day before (with TrueCrypt) and it showed around 90 MB/s of formatting speed.
After a series of rebooting and benchmarking via HD Tune (also in Windows Safe Mode) I realized that at the start (basically the first time after a bootup) the hard drive worked fine with an average of about a 100 MB/s transfer rate. However, at around 60%+ it sunk drastically to a minimum of 1.4 and a maximum of 1.5 MB/s. It stayed there till the end of the benchmark and for every following one (until you rebooted).
Next thing I did was to change the BIOS settings for the JMicron SATA/PATA Controller from Enabled / IDE to Enabled / AHCI. After the Windows bootup it recognized a new Primary IDE channel, Secondary IDE channel, Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller and one of my two optical drives (why only one? Don't ask me 
). The hard drive didn't show up at all - neither in the Disk Management nor in the Device Manager. A change from Enabled / AHCI to Enabled / RAID (with "no raid" in the JMicron settings) did the same thing: recognition of new channels and no new hard drive.
The first run with an HDD on the JMicron controller.
Every other run following the first one with an HDD on the JMicron controller.
For reference - this is what a healthy drive usually looks like:
This is what a healthy HDD usually looks like in HD Tune.
When I looked that the Device Manager I found that there were two SATA controllers in the IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers category. One was the Intel(R) ICH8 2 port Serial ATA Storage Controller - 2825 and the other one was the Intel(R) ICH8 4 port Serial ATA Storage Controller - 2820. My main / old hard drives are all hooked to the 4 SATA ports on the lower half of the P5B, some of them using an eSATA to SATA cable. So that had to be the 4 port SATA controller, which worked fine. Thus, the 2 port controller was the one controlling the eSATA port in the back pane - and making trouble.
The moral of the story is that obviously the JMicron SATA/PATA Controller doesn't do his job on the ASUS P5B at all. So, in case you're looking for more SATA ports, you're going to have to buy a new SATA controller.
I myself will be settling with SATA and eSATA for my biggest drives and using USB for my smallest one.
Cheers