Common Network Issues
- Wi-Fi drops — clients disconnect randomly, weak signal in specific rooms, or 2.4GHz works but 5GHz doesn't. Often caused by channel congestion, DFS events, or failing access points.
- VPN failures — tunnel won't establish, drops after 30 seconds, or routes traffic but DNS leaks. Common in IPsec, OpenVPN, and WireGuard setups behind NAT.
- DNS problems — intermittent resolution failures, NXDOMAIN for names that definitely exist, or split-horizon DNS returning the wrong view.
- Replication lag — database replicas falling behind, AD replication failing, or DNS zone transfers timing out. Usually a network-throughput or firewall issue.
- Slow connectivity — high latency, packet loss, or throughput far below the link capacity. Causes range from bufferbloat to a duplex mismatch on a legacy switch.
- Router config — port-forwarding rules that don't forward, firewall rules that block the wrong traffic, or NAT loops that break hairpin connections.
Network Troubleshooting Process
- 1. Define the symptom. "Internet is slow" is not a symptom — "5Mbps down on a 1Gbps link, 80ms latency to the gateway, 2% packet loss" is.
- 2. Layer-by-layer check. Layer 1 (cable / SFP / port LED), Layer 2 (ARP, VLAN tagging, MAC table), Layer 3 (routing, ICMP), Layer 4 (TCP handshake, MTU), Layer 7 (DNS, HTTP).
- 3. Isolate the fault domain. Is it the client, the access layer, the distribution layer, the edge, or the ISP? Each test narrows the scope.
- 4. Hypothesis & test. Form a most-likely cause, test it (packet capture, MTR, nslookup), document the result.
- 5. Fix & verify. Apply the fix, re-run the original symptom test, and confirm the metric is back to baseline.
Remote vs Onsite Network Support
Remote network support
Most configuration issues — router rules, switch VLANs, VPN tunnels, DNS records — can be fixed remotely through Remote Assist. The engineer accesses your router / switch / firewall admin UI, makes the change, and verifies it.
Onsite network support
Physical-layer problems need hands-on attention: a bad cable, a failing switch port, a miswired patch panel, or an access point mounted in the wrong place. Onsite engineers bring cable testers and spare parts to fix physical issues in a single visit.
Network Security
A misconfigured network is a security hole. Common issues our engineers look for:
- Admin interfaces exposed to the public internet (router admin UI, switch SSH, database ports).
- Default credentials still in place on routers, switches, or access points.
- No segmentation between guest Wi-Fi and the corporate network.
- VPN configurations that allow split-tunnelling into untrusted networks.
- Firewall rules that allow "any to any" because someone was debugging six months ago and forgot to remove it.
Pair network support with a Fixspert cybersecurity audit to get a full picture of what's exposed and how to lock it down.