Sky Q

[a l e x]

We’ve recently had a sky Q mini box fitted at our new house. The main box is in the living room, the mini is at the other end of the house. The sky engineer said it was too far for WiFi so has put an Ethernet cable round the house. The Ethernet cable connects straight into the back of the main sky box which connects via WiFi.

Why does it connect straight into the main box and not the router? Surely I could plug the main box into the router via ethernet and then the mini into the router also?

We’ve been having loads of issues with connections and looking for a way to sort it rather than sitting on the phone with sky for hours on end...

Thanks.

 

[Deleted member 498601]

We’ve recently had a sky Q mini box fitted at our new house. The main box is in the living room, the mini is at the other end of the house. The sky engineer said it was too far for WiFi so has put an Ethernet cable round the house. The Ethernet cable connects straight into the back of the main sky box which connects via WiFi.

Why does it connect straight into the main box and not the router? Surely I could plug the main box into the router via ethernet and then the mini into the router also?

We’ve been having loads of issues with connections and looking for a way to sort it rather than sitting on the phone with sky for hours on end...

Thanks.

I wouldn't think it matters - instead of the main box sending data packets directly to the mini unit, it would instead send them to it via the router. Both methods should work imo. Of course, this would depend on how your router is set up etc...

 

[DJT75]

Sky Q doesn't make sense, full stop. Sometimes when my main box decides to stop working, the mini's still work perfectly fine. Bizarre

 

[The Dude]

I *think* the mini box connects directly to the master, rather than to your WiFi.

If your main sky box is in cabling reach of your router you may as well go wired on the main box as well.

 

[avp]

We've got our Sky Q and Mini's connected directly to a network switch. If memory serves me right, there's an option in the menu to tell the box you're using ethernet instead of wifi. Our network has been rock solid, no issues at all.

 

[nheather]

The minis get their ‘signal’ fed to it by the main Q Box.

So arrives at the satellite, down to the Main Q then to the Mini.

Or if it is an on-demand thing it comes down the broadband connection, to your router, to the Main Q to the Mini.

Either way it is the Main Q that sends the video to the Mini. So ethernet between the Main Q and the Mini will give you the best performance.

If it is more convenient then you could ethernet the Mini to the router instead but then the route to the Mini will always include a wifi hop from the Main Q to the router. It will work but connection is not as stable or fast as a direct ethernet.

But having said that, if the ethernet between the Mini and router is more convenient or tidier then go for it.

Cheers,

Nige

 

[a l e x]

Thanks all. My Q is backwards. I can’t connect to the network on either unless both are switched on...

 

[ufo550]

That don't sound right..

 

[a l e x]

That don't sound right..

Sky sending someone out... god knows what’s wrong with it!

 

[nheather]

What sort of problems are you experiencing and who is your broadband supplier?

Firstly, if broadband supplier is Sky then the boxes (both main and mini) operate as wifi hotspots. If a non-Sky broadband then they don’t.

My system is all up and running now but I still experience some funnies if I move about the house with my tablet as the connection jumps from one device to another.

When I first set up the system I experienced something really strange. I originally had my Main Q boxes connected up with a PowerPlug as I thought that would be better for on demand than using WiFi. All was fine until my son bought an Amazon Fire TV for his bedroom in the loft conversion. This was connecting by WiFi to the Mini in a bedroom (the nearest hotspot). This was communicating by WiFi down to the Main Q downstairs. Which I assume was talking back to the router by WiFi and ethernet (over HomePlug). The Amazon Fire TV would see the network with a good connection but fail to authenticate. We actually sent the first one back thinking it was faulty but the replacement Amazon Fire TV was exactly the same. We were very puzzled until just by chance I disconnected the HomePlug at the Main Q - suddenly the Fire TV burst into life and authenticated. Just to check, plugged the HomePlug in and the Fire TV failed. So something about having the Main Q being able to connect to the router by WiFi and Ethernet at the same time causes a problem - never really understood why - just accepted to leave the ethernet disconnected. Sky haven’t been able to explain it either.

Cheers,

Nigel

 

[Trollslayer]

It depends which has priority e.g. with Android Ethernet has priority.
Part of my job is testing an android based product and for Wi-Fi testing I have the procedure with DISCONNECT ETHERNET at the top.

 

[nheather]

It depends which has priority e.g. with Android Ethernet has priority.
Part of my job is testing an android based product and for Wi-Fi testing I have the procedure with DISCONNECT ETHERNET at the top.

In my case I’d forgotten all about the ethernet connection. I’d connected it at the beginning to see if it was any better than WiFi, found that there wasn’t a huge real world difference and thought I had disconnected it. It wasn’t until about 6 months later when my son had the Amazon Fire TV problems that I found it was still disconnected. Until then and other than the Fire TV it hadn’t caused any problems.

Cheers,

Nigel

 

[nheather]

Another issue that I have with Sky Q is this.

Sky won’t or can’t help. I simply get patronising responses from them. Also they have now introduced new policy that the Sky Q team won’t deal with WiFi hotspot queries. They need to be escalated to the broadband team who you can’t speak to directly and when you do are only interested in the outside line to the router. So the Sky Q WiFi communications are pretty much unsupported.

My issue. I have 73Mbps fibre. If I measure it using ethernet at the router I get pretty much the full 73Mbps. If I connect my ipad to the router when in the same room as the router I get a solid 60+ Mbps.

One thing about my setup that confounds Sky support is that my router and Main Q box are in different rooms. Sky Support appear to assume that they are always colocated so when trying to help they will ask you to connect the two with ethernet. When you explain that they are 8 metres apart and in different roons they get really perplexed.

So I mostly sit in the lounge near my Sky Q box when using my iPad. So my iPad is connect to the hotspot in the Q box which is routing it to the router and then out to the internet. Sometime browsing will get really sluggish, I do a speed check and find that I’m down to 10Mbps down and bugger all up. I go into the study and stand next to the router and suddenly I’m getting 60+ down. Back to the lounge and the connection hops over to the Q and back down to 10. Hard reset the Q box and now it is back up to 40-50. Just to test what signal is available to the Sky Q I sit my iPad on top of the Q and power off the Q so my iPad is seeing the same WiFi signal from the router that the Q would get. And behold I get a 60+ connection.

So it seems like the Q hotspot technology performs badly. When it is working at its best it loses between 10 and 20Mbps. But sometime it absolutely dies - you then have to wait a while for it to sort itself out or force it with a hard reset.

And on every occasion when the signal is poor, if I force a connection to the router instead the performance is great. In my opinion the Sky Q box is definitely at fault.

Sky do not understand the problem, will not acknowledge it, will not come out to see it. However, they are happy to patronise me over the phone explaining that what you get at the wall socket is not what you will get as WiFi. But they refuse to listen to my claims to understand that and my counter-arguments - they just refuse to listen and treat me as an idiot.

Cheers,

Nigel

 

[Trollslayer]

Wi-Fi bandwith is problematic because with so many dwellings having it there are a lot of networks overlapping with resulting conflicts and sharing of channels.
I don't use Wi-Fi here so I switch mine off in order to avoid making things worse for others.
When it comes to network conflicts Sky can't do anything.

 

[nheather]

Wi-Fi bandwith is problematic because with so many dwellings having it there are a lot of networks overlapping with resulting conflicts and sharing of channels.
I don't use Wi-Fi here so I switch mine off in order to avoid making things worse for others.
When it comes to network conflicts Sky can't do anything.

Ahh but you are doing exactly what Sky did to me. They would say that the Q couldn’t get a good wifi signal from the router hich was why it was dropping 20Mbps.

But then I explained that I put my iPad on top of the Q box, so exactly the same environmental restraints, connected that to the router over WiFi and didn’t lose the 20Mbps.

But then Sky didn’t listen (or understand) and just kept repeating themselves.

Going through the Q definitely loses 20Mbps.

Cheers,

Nigel

 

[Trollslayer]

It isn't dropping the signal.
Wi-Fi does a lot of negotiation when there are conflicting networks.
Look up "Wi-Fi hidden node" for a simple example.

 

[a l e x]

My broadband supplier is not sky. Basically if the mini box is on, all is fine. If the mini box is on standby my main box won’t connect to the network so I cannot download, use Netflix, voice search etc. I switch the mini on and it sorts it. The mini then has an issue and has to find the connection again. Sky are sending an engineer round apparently but not until next week.

 

[nheather]

Is this how it is connected up



And are you saying that with the Q Mini turned on then the Q Main works. But with the Q Mini turned off the Q Main doesn't work.

If so, I know it doesn't make a lot of sense, just humour me, disconnect the ethernet from the Q Main. Does the Q Main work now?

Cheers,

Nigel

 

[a l e x]

Is this how it is connected up

View attachment 1116988

And are you saying that with the Q Mini turned on then the Q Main works. But with the Q Mini turned off the Q Main doesn't work.

If so, I know it doesn't make a lot of sense, just humour me, disconnect the ethernet from the Q Main. Does the Q Main work now?

Cheers,

Nigel

Sure does! As soon as you disconnect the Ethernet it makes the connection straight away!

 

[nheather]

Okay, can you easily connect the ethernet between the Mini and the Router - instead of Mini to Main.

If you can, see if both Mini and Main box will work independently then.


Personally, I’m sure that there is a technical issue with the Q Main having both wifi and ethernet connections. That was what was stopping my son’s Fire TV from autheticating. This shouldn’t be a problem, I’m beginning to think it is a design flaw.

Cheers,

Nigel

 

[Trollslayer]

My broadband supplier is not sky. Basically if the mini box is on, all is fine. If the mini box is on standby my main box won’t connect to the network so I cannot download, use Netflix, voice search etc. I switch the mini on and it sorts it. The mini then has an issue and has to find the connection again. Sky are sending an engineer round apparently but not until next week.

That sounds like a bug to me and I tested STBs for seven years including a bit on Sky boxes.

 

[tom 2000]

Sure does! As soon as you disconnect the Ethernet it makes the connection straight away!

If you ask me the main box is preferring the Ethernet connection but of course that is a road to nowhere in terms of getting to the outside world. I have my main and two minis meeting at a switch in the roof space which in turn connects to router. Rock solid. It avoids a bundle of cables being fed to the router.

 

[a l e x]

Spoke with sky earlier, they think there’s an issue with one or both boxes so are coming to have a look/replace.

 

[Trollslayer]

If the main box network switch is integrated with the main chip there could be hardware issues.

 

[nheather]

Spoke with sky earlier, they think there’s an issue with one or both boxes so are coming to have a look/replace.

Are you able to connect the ethernet as mini<>router rather than mini<>main?

Be interesting to see if it works that way round.

Personally I don’t think there is anything wrong with your specific boxes - I’m convinced that there is a design fault. My money is on the fault still geing there after they replace the boxes.

Cheers,

Nigel