Obi 100 - failing to add a device (problem with Netis Router)

[jak3676]

New Obi & Google Voice user here (but a long-time network engineer)

Error message I'm getting is "Failed to connect to your device. Please check your device's internet connection:"  

I've checked multiple times - tried swapping ethernet cables and ethernet ports without any luck.  When I do the **9-222-222-222  check, I get an echo back just fine, but when I do the **5 #### it just times out.  

If it helps, my power light is solid green, the network light blinks very briefly every few seconds, the phone icon flashes steadily when I pick up the reciever.  Seems like a connection issue between my Obi 100 and the internet - just not sure where the problem is.

I checked both my home router (Netis WF-2404D) and my DSL modem (Westel 6100G) and I've turned off both devices firewalls and port filters.  

Maybe my ISP is filtering my traffic?  Not sure what else I can try.  Thoughts?

[QBZappy]

jak3676,

Take the OBi to your office or a friend's house to do the **5 thingy. This is done only one time to introduce the ATA to the OBiTALK servers. Once you set it up you will hopefully never need to do it again.

[giqcass]

You could try opening the suggested ports or put your OBI in DMZ.
http://www.obihai.com/FAQ.html#ports-to-keep-open-on-my-router

Re read you post.  That is a curious problem.  Can you manually add your OBi to the portal?
I personally decided to set mine up locally and I don't use OBI talk service.  You might also try connecting your OBI directly to your router to perform the registration then try putting everything back to it's normal config.

[jak3676]

"Take the OBi to your office or a friend's house"  - I'll give that a try.  May take a few days, everyone is on break this week. 

"Can you manually add your OBi to the portal?"  How do you do that?  I didn't see that in any of the FAQ's.

While I'm thinking about it - I'll try plugging in the Obi directly to the modem and try swapping my new Netis router back to my old Cisco one.  This is where I wish I still had a dumb hub lying around to watch the traffic on wireshark. 

[QBZappy]

jak3676,

A computer with 2 nics will give same results as a hub, using wireshark.

[jak3676]

Yeah - I don't have a PC with 2 NICs anymore.  

I just tried flashing the firmware on my Netis router - something I should have done as soon as I installed it anyway.  No luck, but it did give me different "forwarding" and "security" options - where the firewall and DMZ settings are located.

I'll try connecting the Obi directly to the DSL modem next - may as well eliminate the router from the equation.  

*edit - yep, that worked (connecting the Obi directly to the modem).  At least I'm to my next steps now.  Of course without a PC connected, I had to log in to Obitalk from my cell phone in order to get a **5 code.  

**edit - after getting the initial configuration done, I got to google voice set up and kept getting "Backing Off".  So I hooked everything back up through my router and I'm continuing to troubleshoot.  The problem seems to be my Netis router (cheap Chinese router with a terrible web admin config page).  

Now I can't even get the Obi to pull an IP address correctly (power light blinks steadily).  But on the router it has a DHCP reservation for the Obi's MAC address.  Hmmm....

[jak3676]

Fixed!  Well - sorta.  Following the tests above, it was easy to see the problem was with one or more of the ports being blocked from my Netis 2404 router.  So plugged my old, trusty Linksys WRT54 into my DSL modem and then I plugged the Obi 100 into the WRT54 - worked just fine.  I then plugged my Netis into the WRT so I still have 802.11N wifi. 

I'm pretty sure all this is just misconfiguration on my part - not knowing or understanding how to allow the required outbound ports on the Netis.  That's what I get for buying a cheap Chinese made router I guess - all the menus and help pages look like they've been poorly translated. 

Thanks all for the help!