Wi-Fi & connectivity

[techbasher]

Depends on your make & model of router and whether your Internet Service Provider has locked it down or not.

General Googling may help once you have the details of your particular router:

https://www.techadvisor.co.uk/how-to/network-wifi/how-change-wi-fi-channel-3325316/

I'm not sure whether it's WiFi channel, signal strength, protocol (wireless b/n/g/ac/whatever) or individual chipset compatibility that's the root cause.  I've played around with various models of router/access point I have lying around the place and nothing conclusive yet.

It sure seems an almighty foul up from Roku...

[Akglenn225]

Especially considering there’s no real tech support. At least none I’ve found. I wonder how many people have been scammed out of $69 to “update” their device over this major tech disaster. The moment the guy from India told me I needed to pay to fix my 3 month old Roku, I realized the number I dialed for tech support was a scam. It’s crazy because it was one of the first things that came up on google for Roku customer service. All I’m saying is beware people. If a person with an Indian accent tells you to pay $69 to “update” your device or that you set up the device wrong if you never called them and paid a set up fee, hang up. 

[Akglenn225]

And my device is also stuck at the “choose your network” step from the factory reset. Unbelievable, less than two weeks after the deadline to return it to amazon, it’s useless. I bought the new fire stick a few days ago and it’s really nice. There’s no way I’m wasting money on another Roku. If Roku uses tech that requires updates, they should have support for when the devices quit working because of those updates, not just customer forums where someone from Roku may or may not respond to you with unhelpful troubleshooting.

I saw one Roku thread where the Roku support guy said if anyone was still having issues, to DM him with their email address and model number. But when I tried to do that, it said I exceeded the number of times to message someone (it was the first time I was messaging anyone). 

[tee_run]

Thank you. I figured out how to change channel on my router. I have a Netgear Nighthawk. Log into www.routerlogin.net and channel can be changed there. Current setting was "automatic", I changed to channel 3. Still no luck with getting Roku devices to connect....uuuughhh! No technical support from Roku...not sure what else to do. Not sure why Roku hasn't seen all these posts and replied they are working on a fix or something. It's apparent with multiple posts for the same exact issue that there's so.ething wrong on the Roku side.

[RokuDanny-R]

Hi everyone,

I would recommend checking out our Support page for troubleshooting issues here: What should I do if I cannot connect to my home network or the internet?

Please answer the following questions so we can get a better understanding of what you are seeing:
- Have you ensured your router is broadcasting a 2.4GHz Wi-Fi network for the device to connect to? Please be aware that the Roku Express/Premiere is only compatible with wireless b/g/n networks on the 2.4 GHz spectrum. 
- Have you tried changing the wireless broadcast channel on the router to see if this will allow your device to connect? If you need assistance with this, you may need to contact your ISP or router manufacturer.
- Have you tried moving the device closer to your router to see if you can get connected? 
- How long have you been experiencing this problem?

If those things still aren't helping, feel free to send me a PM with your Roku account email address and the serial number of your Roku from Settings>System>About along with the answers to the above questions and I'll be able to assist you further from there.

Thanks,
Danny

[Sean111]

Did Roku answer this problem? Is there help anywhere?

[Akglenn225]

Yeah, I just tried to PM you and was given the following message, “You have reached the limit for number of private messages that you can send for now. Please try again later.” 

...Um, this is the first Private message I’ve tried to send. I got the same message a week ago when I tried to message another Roku employee on this forum. Again, that message was never able to be sent either. Same message and no way to send the message. 

Unbelievable. 

[techpuppy]

I did get a message through to Danny. I provided the information in the questions he asked. He then forwarded that on to someone in customer service who I hope to hear from sometime soon. If there's any resolution I'll pass it along if it's not already posted here.

[karason]

It won't connect if the network is using both 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz.

Most modern routers combine these two frequencies on the same network so you don't really know which band you are using. But it seems some devices have problems connecting to a combined network.

I solved this by creating a separate 2.4Ghz network for Roku. Seems to work fine now.

If you can't create a separate (guest) network you can also just downgrade your network to 2.4Ghz only. Performance might suffer but at least you should be able to connect.

Surprised that Roku support is not aware of this :S

[Akglenn225]

My internet hasn’t changed and for 3 months it connected without any issues. I’ve always only had 5G service and the device worked great for those 3 months. The change had to have been on the Roku side.