UK user - unable to connect to WIFI (BT home hub)

[Spiritseeker]

Hi all,

I recently purchased 2 Echoes in the US, one for me and one for my parents. When I got back to the UK, I was able to set up my Alexa no problem, on a Virgin Superhub. I've given my parents the other for Christmas, and after about 4 hours of repeatedly trying, we have given up on it. It just cannot connect to the Wifi!

Initially it would not get past the stage where it looks for your device being registered. I was eventually able to register it (after connecting by tethering to my iphone's hotspot), but it can never connect to my parents wifi.
I have successfully managed to get it up and running when it is tethered to my iPhone (Alexa set up is complete and she is connected and will respond), but this is obviously a very temporary solution.

I believe the issue lies within the fact that the BT home hub DNS default is 192.168.11.x. My parents don't know how to change it, nor are they willing to (or allow me to try - probably a good thing as I don't know what I'm doing there anyway). Is there any way around this? It's so frustrating! Everything else in the house is connected to the WIFI no problem. Only Alexa has an issue.

The wifi is broadcasting on an automatic setting, which is currently channel 1.
It's being repeated on a HUWAEI extender - maybe it's possible to get that to broadcast a different DNS?
Or maybe a VPN, but I don't know how to do this - any good tutorials?

At the moment, I feel like I have given a rubbish Christmas present! Will the Echo support help a UK user?

[jwlv]

Although it is much more convenient to have all Wifi routers, bridges, repeaters with the same SSID (Wifi network name), it often creates a lot of problems for any devices that connect to them.

As suggested by several other people, if your Wifi router has both 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands, they each should have a different network name. (e.g. homenet24 and homenet5). If you use Wifi range extenders, it too should have a different name (e.g. homenetext). Some devices might have no problems with the same network name, but there's no guarantee that anything else will work that way.

[Spiritseeker]

Thanks for the response.

I have renamed the extender so that the SSID is now "repeater". So no capital letters, numbers, special characters etc. But Alexa will still not connect.

I remain convinced that the issue is with the DNS, as in the thread on this page:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/forums/ref=cs_hc_g_pl?ie=UTF8&forumID=Fx1SKFFP8U1B6N5&cdThread=Tx37M4WAQSM31RU&cdPage=1&cdMsgId=Mx32LI8J951XWZ3#Mx32LI8J951XWZ3
but following all the suggestions on this thread is not solving the issue.

Is there anything you can buy to plug into a hub which will broadcast on a different DNS? My parents are not willing to change this on their existing hub so I am out of ideas now.

[jwlv]

If the problem with 192.168.11.xxx address is indeed true (although I find it hard to believe), another way to do this is to use another router that is capable of being used as a repeater/bridge. In other words, the second router would act like a Wifi extender, but it has its own network with its own address. And this is where you can set the address to something other than 192.168.11.xxx. Not all routers have this capability. You might also check your Wifi extender to see if it can already do this on its own.

Thanks for the response.

I have renamed the extender so that the SSID is now "repeater". So no capital letters, numbers, special characters etc. But Alexa will still not connect.

I remain convinced that the issue is with the DNS, as in the thread on this page:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/forums/ref=cs_hc_g_pl?ie=UTF8&forumID=Fx1SKFFP8U1B6N5&cdThread=Tx37M4WAQSM31RU&cdPage=1&cdMsgId=Mx32LI8J951XWZ3#Mx32LI8J951XWZ3
but following all the suggestions on this thread is not solving the issue.

Is there anything you can buy to plug into a hub which will broadcast on a different DNS? My parents are not willing to change this on their existing hub so I am out of ideas now.

[Spiritseeker]

You're probably right that it's not the DNS issue. We purchased a new router and have set hat up - Alexa will still not connect to the wifi.

The new router is dual band and we named the 2 bands asus24 and asus5 but Alexa won't connect to either. Occasionally in the update wifi process (now performed around 150 times and I am not lying, this is almost all I've done since Christmas Day morning!) it will show as already connected to the wifi network (when it scans for networks I see the word "connected" In green alongside the wifi network I am trying to connect to) but that doesn't mean anything as I am still led through the setup process and it always fails to connect.

How can this be so difficult?

[bobre]

Was this ever solved - I have the same problem and also with BT router. Was fine when I was on Sky but since moving to BT I can't connect with identical symptoms. Also... the Echo can connect on other networks. Eek.

[Masterpop]

Hello, as the device has been released in the U.K. Now I have bought one and have the same problem.

I was able to register and connect while tethered to my mobile phone, but it is steadfastly refusing to connect to my wifi. I think this is extremely poor ...

I can see that it acquires an IP address, but it claims there is no internet. If anyone has a solution please let us know. Thanks.

[DParker]

Hello, as the device has been released in the U.K. Now I have bought one and have the same problem.

I was able to register and connect while tethered to my mobile phone, but it is steadfastly refusing to connect to my wifi. I think this is extremely poor ...

I can see that it acquires an IP address, but it claims there is no internet. If anyone has a solution please let us know. Thanks.

Is your router blocking any IP ports?

[Masterpop]

Thank you very much for your reply Mr Parker. While it didn't directly help (mostly because the BT HH5 is a useless router that the logs were not very helpful).

However I have solved the problem. I think it is related to some kind of dns issues. The "solution", for me at least: when you are in set up mode in the app, you select your wifi network, but then go to advanced settings and manually set ip,gateway,subnet mark, and dns servers.

I used the dns server address i found in the router's settings. And this seemed to allow it to connect.

[DParker]

All's well that ends well. 

[ramage]

I had same problem when I tried to connect using BT Home Hub 5.  Advised by Amazon that the problem seemed to be with BT, and that they would be dealing.  Did a bit of tinkering and switched off my "BT Net Protect" which is a service provided to filter "risky" web addresses.  Echo connected very soon afterwards (BT say up to 2 hours to cancel Net Protect) and has been working well ever since.  This morning I switched Net Protect on and Echo failed to connect within a few minutes.  Switched off Net Protect and it came back within a couple of hours.

BT Net protect blocks Echo and should be switched off.

Hope this helps