D4 crashing/bricking multiple Spectrum EU2251 modems?

Two of us play D4 on PCs. We didn’t play the beta/server slam content - we started during Early Access. Played Friday night, most of Saturday, and were attempting to play today (Sunday). We’ve bricked the first EU2251 modem and thought we did the same to the second modem, but that modem seems to have finally recovered and connected. Hardware info at the end.

Sunday (6/4) morning we both disconnected while playing the game - grouped together as a party of 2 in a dungeon. Router was functioning (LAN/Wifi worked) but Spectrum modem was hung (lights were correct/connected but internet was out). Tried to reboot the modem, and while it would power on and the “online” light would pulse as if it were attempting to connect. It never succeeded at connecting and after waiting through the Spectrum customer service queue and them telling us the connection to our house was fine, they had us wait until the nearest local store opened (30 minutes away) to swap out our modem for a new one.

Fast forward about 7-8 hours after installing a brand new Spectrum EU2251 modem, and the same exact thing happens - both players in a party (this time just wandering the world collecting Lilith shrines) and the internet hangs again. Router still works (LAN/Wifi responds) but the modem is frozen. Rebooted the modem, powers up but flashes “online” as it attempts to reconnect. We made sure to wait at least a minute before powering it back on, too. Waited through another Spectrum customer service queue to be told their soonest available tech appointment wasn’t until Thursday and that they’d call within a half hour to see if they had any sooner appointments.

As I’m on the call 20 minutes later, finding out there’s no sooner Spectrum tech appointments, and the modem (which has been plugged in the whole time doing its “connecting” flash) finally reconnects to the internet. I’m wondering if this doesn’t hint that the modem had overheated or something and it took that long to cool down?

In any case, I felt it worth a report because I can’t believe I’ve nearly wrecked 2 modems in 8 hours just because 2 players are playing D4 at the same time. I would’ve totally expected the router to fail before the modem, and even game traffic crashing a router would be pretty wild to me. Obviously I can’t repro the issue reliably enough (nor am I willing to destroy that many modems when it takes me an hour to travel to and back from the Spectrum store) - but I’m also seeing that D4 and router crashes is something mentioned before here on the forums and reddit.

We’re going to try removing our PC’s traffic priority on the router, but I doubt that’s going to make a measurable impact. I also read some people suggesting disabling cross play, which would be unfortunate since we have out of state family members that play on a playstation and we’d like to be able to group. If there are any other suggestions on things we could try to take some stress off the modem, please let me know.

  • Spectrum EU2251 modem
  • TPLink Archer AXE95 router
  • 2 Windows 10 PCs connected via ethernet cable
  • Both players in a group with each other and no other players in group or nearby when modem crashes occurred

Update: went to sleep shortly after the modem finally reconnected, and woke up to find it dead again. Rebooting did not fix it. Spectrum saw it go offline 3 times that night and it wouldn’t return online in the morning. Exchanged it for a THIRD modem - Spectrum had no other modem models it could provide in our area. It’s again <24 hours since picking up modem #3 and it appears to be frozen again.

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I would like to chime in and say that I have been plagued by the same problem since the early release launch. I am also a Spectrum customer, and Diablo IV periodically crashes my entire internet connection. When this happens, I have to wait approximately 15 to 30 minutes for my connection to be restored. For reference, my modem is a Spectrum-issued model E31N2V1 (different from the OP’s), and I have already replaced it once without success. Were I to swap my modem again, Spectrum would hand me the same model. Several chats with Spectrum tech support have revealed that the problem is indeed with my modem and that my router (SAX1V1S) seems to be working just fine.

I would appreciate a solution as soon as possible. Please bear in mind that those of us who rent equipment from ISPs are usually in no position to tweak the settings of the devices, so we simply take the ISP’s word that they keep their routers and modems updated with the latest firmware. At the very least, it would be helpful to get a precise explanation from Blizzard about what this problem is.

We have now wrecked Spectrum EU2251 modem #3 within 12 hours of setting it up.

When we exchanged modem #2 for modem #3, spectrum support told us they could see the modem frequently disconnecting at least 3 times overnight after the initial freeze (while we were sleeping). We asked if they had any other models of modem we could try and they said this is the only model for our area.

We have a tech coming out ASAP, and that means Thursday (2 more days). Until then, our only solution is just to constantly exchange modems as they break. We live in a rural area so the trip to spectrum is a 1 hour round trip.

This time we had set both D4 games to disable cross-play, and I also removed the QOS settings on the router that prioritized traffic from our two gaming PCs hoping that it might help the situation. Clearly neither of those things worked.

On to modem #4. Sigh.

Do you live in a shared building? What kind of lines are being used to the modem to connect it up? It’s possible that there is some kind of power surge occurring on the line that could be causing issues with the modem. This is most common in apartments and other shared living spaces.

It’s a home. We moved here just over a year ago. Router is new (I think around 6 months old).

Spectrum CS did say that the only other thing they could think of that we could check was that the ground wire was connected properly and that there was no damage (i.e. squirrels chewing on) any of the coax cables, and we verified that.

Other than that, they could give us no other options besides swapping out the modem every time it happens until we reach our scheduled tech visit.

When we first moved in they had to re-do some of the connections to the home over some damaged cables so since then it’s been a year without any issues. Even Thursday night/Friday/Saturday binging on D4 (took off work on Friday) there were no issues. Now we’re breaking modems repeatedly since Sunday evening.

Also having issues with this modem and spectrum while playing d4.

Noticed it two nights ago and has been a consistent issue since then. Get insane rubberbanding/lag randomly while playing. Try to use the internet, watch a stream and experience issues.

Also noticed I would have issues with Discord where it would randomly crash while playing D4. I’d also have issues when I would stream to Discord and people would say it was just a frozen screen.

Lost a hardcore character due to this. Literally can’t play hardcore.

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