Sinus 1054 DSL wireless router & modem - Germany

Has anyone got any experience with the shitty sinus 1054 dsl wireless router/modem?

We have one of these as it came with our new DSL connection and its been kinda ok, but it is getting to me for a few reasons. There are a few things that I hate about it, but the biggest ones are as follows.

1. The DHCP server is not reserving ip addresses:
Now I know thats not the idea of a DHCP server, but I have seen them configured so that if your machine goes offline for some reason, the DHCP server will reserve that IP addy for a small amount of time. The effect being that you do not get a new IP addy every time you reboot. This router does not do this, my old one did, my work ones do. It is not running out of address as I only have 3 devices and the DHCP address range is relatively huge.
I do not wish to use static IP's as some of the computers often get used on different networks and its a pita changing IP's all the time.

2. I cant work anything out on this pos router cos its all in German with no options for English. I havent found any English biosses (new word for the day) and all web sites with peer feedback/advice are naturally in German so I cannot find info's easily for this router.

Ahhh I hate it. Someone help me before I go out and buy a new one!.

p.s. We might be going to GMX or 1&1 soon.. Anyone know what the fritz dsl modems are like? English OS? Nicely configurable? Do they have built in dyndns support?

Thanks for any advice.

World of pain mate, world of pain.

I've tried updating the bios. I've tried the forums. I've tried here. I've tried hard wiring it. I've tried rebooting the router. I've tried shaking the box while holding it upside down. Nothing works.

I have a laptop and if I suspend it, I have to reboot to be about to access DNS. If I type in a website's IP I can get through, but it sits there "looking" for anything new.

I have used this laptop with my router in Edinburgh, with my parents router, with my collaborators in the states -- all with no problems. Sinus DSL 154 Basic == POS.

Having said that, I'm too tight to go out and buy a new one, and it was free, so I can't really complain that much...

Actually mine is the 1054 not the 154, but I guess its a similar POS beast...

154...


1054...

...and I thought that as technology developed it was meant to get smaller, not larger!

Fair enough. Best of luck fixing it!

Both the 154 and the 1054 are excellent devices, and certainly worth what you pay for them (usually under €30, often free). Many real problems (most usually failure to automatic dial) are solved in recent firmware upgrades.

You DHCP server issue should not be a problem - simply set the DHCP lease time ("Gultigkeitsdauer") to permanent ("ständig") so the same PC always gets and keeps the same address - see page 38 of the manual

You are unlikely to get any English language firmware for hardware intended for Germany that includes a DSL modem, as the modem protocols are unique to this country and the firmware manages the protocol, so there is no market for English support. There are a few exceptions to this rule - Later Belkin routers are often in English, as their modem protocols are implemented in hardware (not a particularly good thing) and newer Netgear routers offer a choice of language. You could always buy a separate modem (no user interface!) and the router of your choice with English interface (even one from a different country).

Fritz devices from AVM are the bees knees in the domestic market (but commensurately more expensive!). Most of their devices only come with German GUIs, unfortunately, as they are only available for the domestic market. The new Fritzbox-Fon systems with VoIP integration are winning almost every award on the market. Not only do they provide the usual modem, firewall, internet and (optionally) wireless functionallity, they include VoIP support (for up to 10 services) with bandwidth optimisation and integration into an existing phone service (analogue or ISDN), so VoIP calls can be recieved/made on a normal phone in conjunction with your normal line

YL6

Bah humbug.. the lease time was already set to ständig, so it not that. Must be a bug or sommat.

There are also some routing probs with this router that are too hard to explain right now on here, but basically means I cannot browse my home hosted web site using the external IP.. I need to put the web servers local IP into the hosts file on the pc's.. Bah humbug again.

Thanks for the tips tho

You don't need to explain this. I know it well. It's a common problem with a number of routers on the German market (and here I have to include AVM/Fritz here). I'm working with their chaps in Berlin to try and solve this one. Not an easy problem, as it's related to some weird issues of IP routing, and in some cases is also provider related. There is not a simple fix at the moment - only a range of workarounds.

WARNING: Don't buy the Netgear Wireless Router/DSL modem - DG854GB. It sucks, I should know since I own one. The first one died due to faulty firmware and the wireless range was horrible. It also disconnected for no reason every 10minutes or so. I thought they were decent...but obviously not due to the number of complaints on many forums.

So Netgear DG834GB =POS x 100 also.

Most of the domestic suppliers of this type of hardware have massive reliability problems. The market is simply too cut-throat and corners have been cut. People are paying less than €100 now for equipment that was costing €300 two years ago. Netgear have a bad reputation for out-of-the box failure. Belkin have long-term hardware reliability problems. Linksys simply have poor firmware code, D-Link a mixture of all three. Mid range (e.g. Draytek) and professional (Cisco) cost more and the better quality shows as a result. Pay the low price and expect the quality accordingly.

Note that all equipment sold in Germany is guaranteed a minimum 2 years by law. Some manufacturers offer "lifetime" guarantees (Netgear, I think). If your equipment does not do what it says in on the packet, exert your rights...

YL6

I had a Sinus 154 DSL Basic from Telekom but found that the signal strength wasn't quite good enough and also had other problems.

I have been told that the routers and modems that Telekom give away free are a pile of crap and am inclined to believe it... I would agree, you get what you pay for...

Have just upgraded to Linksys WRT54GP2 and works like a dream with my VoIP account and stronger signal. Still a few glitsches as I only bought it yesterday and probably needs tweaking... This router also enables you to prioritise VoIP traffic...

The Sinus 1054 made my head hurt, yes pun intended.

I don't remember exactly how I got it configured to allow Bittorrent and Emule. But it was a b*tch and a half for sure. And no, I didn't use DMZ ;-)

Hopefully it doesn't ever crash or I may be screwed. Maybe there's a setting to export firmware file to disk that I'll find when I feel less lazy.

As a chip maker... I can tell you half the corners being cut (which my company manages to avoid pretty well). Those 30 euro boxes are filled with a lot of badly made, poorly tested, and dirt cheap slices of semiconductor.

-dave

In the main it's the firmware that's bad, or poorly tested, not the hardware... such is the existence of an ASIC

Yeah, if the firmware is bad then everyone sees the results of each bug. I tested firmware once too, and there it's even easier to cut corners.

But infant mortality, very short signal range, and anything else which is fixed by replacing the unit... obviously bum hardware.

Sorry to bring up an old topic... but, I'm going to anyway. I got the 1054 router. I've got it working cabled, but don't know how to do the rest of the work to make it work as a wireless device. Compounding my problem is the fact that I'm using a Mac I-book and can't seem to find any Mac software for turning on the encryption, etc.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. If I don't need the software, please let me know how to set up the router or my I-book to do it. Thanks gang.

This is easy.

Better to use safari (2.0.1) on mine works, as firefox aint that reliable with the highly sophisticated Telekom software which is very much PC/Internet Explorer designed.

Connect iBook with normal cat-5 cable to LAN socket on router.
Type, 192.168.2.1 and hit enter.
Click 'konfiguration setup' (or something like that)
Type '0000' for the password, hit enter.

Now you are in the router, you don't need any other software for configuring the box. Infact, if you turn on your airport card, look for WLAN as the wireless access point, and connect, that is the default, unsecured setup.

Then knowing german a bit would help as you can then navigate to the settings in the router.

Ask if you want more info.

KT