To Fix Most Internet Problems, Cycle the Power on Your Router and Radio

We’ve made an interesting discovery over the years we’ve been helping members fix the occasional LCWA internet access problems they have at their homes. The discovery is this: 90% of all internet access problems are due to the member’s router. And 90% of those router issues can be solved by simply cycling the power on the router.

What does “cycling the power” mean? It means pulling out the electrical power plug that leads to the router, waiting two minutes, and then plugging it back in. Wait another minute or two for the router to reconnect with the internet and you are fixed! It is remarkable in how many cases this fixes everything. By the way, cycling the power is not the same thing as pushing the Reset button on the router—please Do Not do that, it will break things! We tell you why in this article.

Why do you need to do this in the first place? There are multiple reasons a router gets “stuck,” but the main one is this: variations in the voltage of the household power. Such variations play havoc with a router and can cause it to freeze up. Cycling the power unfreezes it.

By the way, it makes sense to also cycle the power on the outdoor LCWA radio at the same time. That’s because about 10% of the time it’s the radio that is the thing that is stuck—and cycling its power will fix it. So, to be safe and save time, when you have an internet problem, just cycle both the router and the radio at the same time.

Also note this: installing an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) on your router and radio can smooth out the power and help prevent the need to cycle the router or radio power in the first place. We have an article about that at this link.

So if your internet is down, cycle the power on both your router and your radio and in most cases that will fix things. If it does not, give our tech support number 800-536-6149 a call and press option 1 to see if there is an outage in your area.