Need serious help. Two times my router got fried leading to other connected devices blowing up.

[CapCloud]

My Appartment has our ISP's junction box which has Fiber input and the through ethernet cables supplies Internet to various flats. Last month during very light rain, while I was using the laptop connected to my old router(very old, barely gave 100mbps through LAN) via ethernet cable. That laptop blew up in my face(Not like actual blow up into pieces), it was like someone threw a flashbang in my face. The power was out in my flat, the mains tripped. I checked behind the laptop, removed all the cables and noticed the Ethernet cable was stuck, I pulled it hard and what do I see? A melted plug. I then checked my router and what do you know, even that one caught fire and blew up. I removed all the ethernet ports and saw the cable that runs down from the top was fried. 

 

At first, I thought it was my socket that had a surge. But no, all electronics in my house were perfect. Even the other devices connected to that socket were working normally. So it has to be from the ethernet. So I went to the roof and checked the Junction box. Surely enough it turned off and caught fire. All the ports on that thing were fried. I called the ISP and told them to come check. The guy replaced the power adaptop, TURNED IT BACK ON AND LEFT WITHOUT TELLING ME ANYTHING. He called me back and told me to check if my internet is working now. I was like, dude my router blew up! He came to my home removed the melted ethernet plug, added a new plug to the same wire and left lmao. He told me "Just buy a new  router, we will set it up for you for free". Keep in mind, I am from a India. It's not that easy to sue people or companies here because shit sucks.

 

I emailed their team, raised tech support for weeks but they ghosted me and stopped caring. No replied, nothing. And I can't do anything because I still have their service(which is really good btw) for another 3 months. The technicians that visited blamed it on so many other things, they even were like why are using an ethernet cable to your laptops... Just use wifi.

 

I got tired and just swallowed the anger. I bought a better Wifi 6 capable router this time so I could free my laptop from ethernet. My laptop's mainboard was just fried, luckily it was still under warranty and they replaced it for free and returned it to me(Although I think the thermal paste was not applied properly because 3080 GPU is at 86 and hostpot reaches 100C). My monitor had all the ports that were connected to my laptop damaged, monitor had warranty too so it was replaced. Even the DP cable had 2 year warranty which I got replaced. I AM SO LUCKY.

 

Fast forward. Now my second router just blew up the exact same way. This time it took my 4k TV which was turned off completely at the socket too. My TV wifi sucks so I used ethernet. What reason do they have now? Junction box is turned off too which means it got tripped again probably fried too. I am fuming!

 

Can anyone who's knowledgable give me some insight on how this can happen? No one else seems to face this issue, it's only my router and its the router everytime, its not that the socket is bad and other devices are fried too. Is there anyway to protect my router from the power that comes down through the Ethernet port from the main ISP junction box? Actually it would have been better if the socket itself was bad because that way I can just put a surge protector to the socket and live with it. What do I do about an ethernet cable?

 

Sorry for the long post and grammar, I'm just really angry at the moment.

[Hairless Monkey Boy]

There are surge protectors that have an ethernet input and output for this exact thing. Just get one of those.

[Needfuldoer]

An Ethernet surge protector should solve your problems. You would want the protection on the edge of your network, before your router. They look like this and are usually made for outdoor networking equipment (like the Ubiquiti point-to-point wireless Linus and Jake installed for their connections between buildings), but they should work for your use case too. It sounds like the network connection is your biggest issue, but it can't hurt to put all your electronics behind surge protectors.

 

We can only guess what the root cause of your problems could be, though. Maybe something is shorting to mains voltage somewhere along the line. Maybe someone keeps messing with the network closet in your building and connecting together things they shouldn't.

[CapCloud]

Wow, I didn't know these existed. I will try them for my next router. 

 

Hopefully tp-link will replcace this router. Either way I'm not gonna let my ISP go this time.

[mariushm]

Ethernet surge protectors MAY solve your problems. A lightning strike has a good chance of going over surge protections and everything... surge protections are for main voltages, over voltages etc.

 

By design ethernet is designed with isolation transformers on the data pairs  ... you have 4 signal transformers (one for each pair) at the router, and four signal transformers at the network card (hidden in the network jack or on the network card circuit board. 

But if there's a lightning strike or some serious weather event the thousands of volts and amps can piece through isolation and can jump in enough amount before the surge protection components can react efficiently. 

 

Absolute best protection would be to completely isolate it using a medium that can't carry electricity - for example fiber optics.  

You can get a couple of media converters  and have one media converter at the device from your ISP that brings you internet inside the house and another media converter near your wireless router / whatever you use then to have network / internet throughout the house.  

 

modem/router from ISP  > ethernet cable  > - media converter  >  fiber cable  > media converter - > ethernet - > your expensive wireless router 

 

The media converters are transparent, they just convert the data bits to light and then convert it back from light to data bits (pulses of electricity through the 8 wires in the ethernet cable)

 

If there's some lightning strike or some bad stuff coming into the modem/router from the ISP and then into the ethernet cable, it will hit the media converter and it would potentially damage it, but because the fiber cable is just glass / plastic , the electricity can not go further and damage your computers or your wireless router etc. 

 

For example, here's a pack of 1 gbps media converters with built in transceivers, so you only need to add the optical cable : 

 

56$ https://www.amazon.com/Gigabit-Ethernet-Converter-1000Base-LX-1000Base-Tx/dp/B06XZ6CV6W/

 

The connectors for this particular media converter kit's  fiber ports are Dual SC / SC Duplex , single mode fiber, so you need a cable like this : 

1. FS.com  SC to SC : https://www.fs.com/de-en/products/40237.html?attribute=195&id=302710

2. Amazon SC to SC : https://www.amazon.com/FiberCablesDirect-Singlemode-Options-0-5M-300M-Single-Mode/dp/B0099S5YYG/

 

 

Here's a kit ( a pair ) of media converters that has the standard SFP port, in which you plug a SFP transceiver that can have various fiber standards (LC, SC, others) 

 

19$ each : https://www.amazon.com/TP-Link-Ethernet-Converter-Supporting-MC220L/dp/B003CFATL0/

 

Example of transceiver (you need one for each media converter) : 

FS.com : https://www.fs.com/de-en/products/11774.html

Amazon : https://www.amazon.com/Transceiver-Multimodule-GLC-LX-SM-RGD-GLC-SX-MMD-MA-SFP-1GB-SX/dp/B095YRKZ8C/

 

Both of these transceivers have the Duplex LC connector for fiber, multimode fiber, so you'd need a fiber like this : 

FS.com :  https://www.fs.com/de-en/products/41730.html

Amazon : https://www.amazon.com/Fiber-Patch-Cable-Multi-Mode-Transceiver/dp/B019OLTQIM/

 

 

This later is a better option , because if you get a lightning strike or some fault and one of the media converters die ... you only need to buy one 20$ media converter with a SFP port and maybe the transceiver if that was blown as well. With the first option, you have to find a media converter that has the Dual SC header  (transceiver built into the media converter) which may be rarer / harder to find. 

 

 

[Lurick]

If you have a good path to ground then you could look at a lightning arrestor for ethernet, they tend to be around $40 for good ones. What you do NOT want is a coupler with no dedicated ground that advertises itself as an arrestor as that will just land you in the same boat.

 

Example (I see a few people saying it failed others say it worked with proof so not 100% on this one):

https://www.amazon.com/Tupavco-Ethernet-Protector-Gigabit-1000Mbs/dp/B00805VUD8/ref=pd_lpo_1?pd_rd_i=B00805VUD8&psc=1

 

Although if you want a guarantee then as @mariushm suggested a converter that puts a non-conductive medium like fiber in the middle is your best albeit more expensive bet.

[CapCloud]

Update:  TP-Link refused repair OR replace my unit because of bullshit reasons. It hasn't even been a month since I got it. What do they even repair? I hate my life. 

How do I get away from all these dumbass companies...

[mariushm]

That's actual normal, don't know what did you expect. 

The warranty is for failures or problems caused by the device itself, not caused by outside problems like lightning strikes, or sending out of normal signals (and power) through the ethernet cable into the device.

They would repair it if the device stops working due to some manufacturing flaw, like bad soldering inside, loose connector, bad power supply that came with the device etc. 

 

By your reasoning anyone bored with their router that's still in warranty period could shove 230v into the ethernet jack or dc input and sent the router to be "repaired" hoping you'd get a more recent  model because the returned one is out of production.

 

[CapCloud]

That makes sense, thanks for the info. But still hurts. Because my Asus Laptop guys didn't mind and basically replaced mainboard for the 2k USD laptop. I guess some companies are just nicer.

[Alex Atkin UK]

9 hours ago, CapCloud said:

That makes sense, thanks for the info. But still hurts. Because my Asus Laptop guys didn't mind and basically replaced mainboard for the 2k USD laptop. I guess some companies are just nicer.

Yes, you got very very lucky there.  It would be quite easy for them to see it wasn't a defect and refuse the warranty, it probably comes down to if they even bothered to check or not.