Newb networking question about my router settings

[gleong]

I just bought a Netgear MR814, and during setup, came across a setting called 'Idle Timeout'. It is currently set at 5 minutes. What does this do? Does it have my router log me off my DSL if my computer is idle for 5 minutes? or does it force my isp to be logged on continuously by sending a signal every 5 minutes?

 

[Lord Evermore]

If your DSL uses PPPoE, then yes it will log you out at whatever period you set, counting from the last time that your computer sent traffic outbound to the Internet. I assume if you set it to 0, it will not log you out, however your ISP may have its own idle timeout, or a forcible timeout. You can run a "keepalive" program which you can get anywhere freeware is available, which sends some packets every once in awhile, to prevent your ISP from timing out the connection.

The timeout really won't make much difference to your usage, as the login sequence should be only a few milliseconds when you start using the connection again, almost unnoticeable and it only happens once when you start sending again after being idle.

 

[gleong]

Ok, Thanks. I'll play around with it and see what happens.

 

[JackMDS]

In most Entry level Cable/DSL Routers. You log into the menus with password. Idle time is the time that the Router's menus will be accessible when there is no action, until you need to log again with the password.

 

[Lord Evermore]

I looked at the manual for that specific router. The idle timeout is listed on the page with the PPPoE login info, in the same "box" as the login info actually. 🙂

 

[skyking]

Originally posted by: JackMDS
In most Entry level Cable/DSL Routers. You log into the menus with password. Idle time is the time that the Router's menus will be accessible when there is no action, until you need to log again with the password.

That is the way it is with the smc I was working on today.