Originally posted on ForCarol.org
UPDATE 1/30/23: I did a WiFi stability test in January 2023. Last night (1/29/23) while watching “Black Panther” on Disney+……the A8G WiFi crapped out….. again….for the LAST TIME! I reconnected the hard-wired switch, and it will stay there for the life of the A8G.
Read on for a nice history lesson. 🙂
This past month, or two, our Sony A8G TV randomly started losing WiFi connectivity. I think it may be the recent updates, but, I have no way of proving that..
When this happens while watching a movie……it SUCKS, as I have to reboot the TV (that is power it off AND disconnect the power cord) to force Android to fully reboot to get WiFi back.
But…..after WiFi is back, it can go out again at some random time later in the movie, or, if we are lucky, in another movie….days or weeks later…..arrrghhh.
Either way, it is frustrating.
I got tired of this happening, soooooo, I decided to connect the hard-wired, RJ-45, Ethernet port of the A8G TV directly to our WIRED ethernet network (which we needed, in 2022, only for the Arlo security camera base-station).
I dislike going back to the old fashioned way of connecting networks.
But, it is what it is.
Read on for the GEEKY details…..:-)
Sony A8G TV With WiFi
The Sony A8G comes with a built in wifi connection, and for the past two years it has been stable and more than fast enough to support 4k content from our chosen streamer.
However, as I mentioned above, that has changed recently as the A8G has started to randomly drop the Wifi connection. It does, however, come back after a full Android reboot leading me to believe that someone is not testing the software updates as well as they should be!
Shame, shame! 😉
But…..this is not a problem for TechyMike.com……I’ll just work around the issue until the updates get fixed. 🙂
The schematic below shows the network connection I had the with TV using WiFi.
The only device that requires a hard-wired connection is the Arlo security camera base-station. All of our other devices (phones, computers, our small Samsung TV in the living room, my PixelBook Go…..etc etc) use the Orbi Wifi….and it is GREAT!
The Orbi then connects, via an RJ-45 cable, to a Netgear cable modem (that we purchased) which then connects to our Xfinity Internet service. It all works great with 350 Mbps download speeds….hey, I’m a geek….more speed is good. 🙂
Sony A8G TV Without Wifi
Because I had an old Netgear ethernet switch capable of supporting “only” 100 Mbps per port, Lori went online and ordered a new 8 port GS608 Netgear switch (from Best Buy) that could support our 350 Mbps download speeds and 4k movies.
The wiring is more complicated, but, once I connected everything correctly (it’s been awhile since I had to wire something) it works great!
No more WiFi dropping, and we can watch glorious 4k movies like we did before. 🙂
Conclusion
TEST August 26, 2022: I disconnected the hardwired ethernet connection to test to see if the WiFi connection is now stable. It’s been perfect, hardwired, since April. This is just a test. 🙂
Wifi is really great…..as long as the devices connected to it work!
The folks developing the software updates should take a bit more time…..hmmmm, a LOT more time…..testing their changes before shipping out the latest version.
GEEK on!
STEM: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math ROCK! A career in those areas will lead to a lifetime of discovery and learning. 🙂
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