Last week, I replaced a failing router with a new Surf SOHO and AP One AC Mini. The installation was straightforward (thank you @Michael234 for https://routersecurity.org/) and everything seems to be working fine. A couple of days ago, however, the AP One AC Mini lost its time synchronization (no more “System: Time synchronization successful” messages in the event log) and now thinks that it’s Dec 31 2017.
The Surf SOHO is still syncing nicely so I think the problem may have something to do with how I’ve connected the AP One to the Surf SOHO:
DSL modem to Surf SOHO WAN
Surf SOHO LAN to HP switch
HP switch to AP One WAN
I connected the AP One to the switch to permit high bandwidth connections between the AP One and other ethernet connected equipment. If I were to connect the AP One to the Surf SOHO, the AP One would be throttled by the SOHO’s 120 Mbps throughput.
How should I configure the Surf SOHO and/or AP One to get the AP One syncing again?
Perhaps the HP switch is “green” and it shuts down Ethernet ports if there has been no traffic for a while? Just a total guess.
There really is no need for the switch. The speed limit of 120Mpbs is only on the Internet/WAN side. On the LAN, all four ports are full Gigabit speed and file transfers on the LAN run close to full GB speed in my experience.
The switch would come in handy if you often did large file transfers that you did not want the router to see. That is, if both devices were connected to the switch. Large file transfers are a cpu hog on the Surf SOHO.
It turns out that I misconfigured the AP One by setting the default gateway to the ISP’s default gateway rather than the Surf SOHO (I’m using static IP for the AP One). I made the change and now see the AP One’s NTP requests going out through the firewall. Time sync restored!
Thank you for your suggestions and for straightening me out about the 120 Mbps, @Michael234.