I thought I'd revisit this topic as over the last few months I've run a number of routers through 10s of hours of rehearsals and gigs.
I've previously shared more detail in this thread - https://support.stagetraxx.com/d/3230-suggestions-on-small-wireless-access-point
In Summary,
- I have a 5 piece band
- I use our band's router for two main functions:
- * All band members connect an iOS/Android phone/tablet with the Behringer mixer app to our Behringer X32 mixer so everyone can manage their individual IEM mix
- * All band members connect an iPad running ST3 as a client and connect to our main ST3 iPad that is running our backing tracks and pushing our timestamped lyric sheets to all 5 clients.
- The iPads being used for running ST3 are:
Host: 9th Gen iPad running iOS 18.5
Clients: 1 x 4th Gen iPad running iOS 16.7.11, 3 x 9th Gen iPads and 1 x iPad PRO running iOS 18.5
The Behringer mixer app, on both iOS and Android devices, seems to have no issues reconnecting if there is any momentary drop-out of WiFi connection. This is based on 4 years of use and observation.
Stage Traxx 3 client devices will randomly suffer from random and inconsistent (i.e. not all at same time) 'Connection closed' errors (i.e. Connection closed. Host has closed or denied the connection). When this occurs, the individual then has to:
- Click on the error to acknowledge it, THEN
- Click at top of app to go back to Settings (this is surprisingly hard to do consistently under gig conditions!), THEN
- Click on the Host network in the 'Available Hosts' list.
At this point after a couple of seconds, the Client will catch up, correct lyric sheet will load (if we've changed songs since the connection closed), and the lyric highlighting will catch up based on current timestamps.
Over the last 6 months, I've tried 3 different routers.
- We started with the TP-Link TL-WR902AC Wireless Travel Router (https://www.tp-link.com/au/home-networking/wifi-router/tl-wr902ac/) that had been working fine for our devices to run the Behringer mixer app for many years, however it seemed unable to cope with running ST3 and we'd get consistent session disconnects every hour.
- I then dug out an old Netgear Nighthawk X8 (https://www.netgear.com/support/product/r8500/) router which is a 'run an entire house for WiFi' type beast. Things were much better, but not perfect. We got down to 2-3 people having maybe 1 disconnect per 5 hour rehearsal or 4 hour gig.
- I then tried a TP-Link VX220-G2v (https://www.tp-link.com/au/service-provider/xdsl/vx220-g2v/) as it was newer than the Netgear X8, supported WPA3, and smaller and easier to carry around. These are common routers provided by internet retailers in Australia (probably other countries too). Things were a little better again than the Netgear X8 - we got down to 1-2 people having maybe 1 disconnect per 5 hour rehearsal or 4 hour gig.
Now, there really is no reason with these last 2 routers, given the number of devices, for there to be any issue. I did do a wireless scan to ensure there wasn't channel contention with surrounding devices. We're not also trying to connect the network to the internet.
I understand ST3 is relying on iOS for the network connection, and that the finger is always going to be pointed to the hardware, the conditions, and at iOS, before anything else. What does frustrate me, is that I have the Behringer mixer app that can happily reconnect if there is any underlying network connection glitch, and yet ST3 bails out and requires manual intervention to recover.
This is obviously not good during a gig. Especially for musicians who have both hands on their instruments.
What I'd like to ask Peter for, is maybe some 'safety net' type guard rails in ST4 that will better handle these situations, and ultimately recover from them without manual intervention.
Given ST will see the error being passed back from iOS about connection closed, why can't ST re-initiate the connection? Sure, maybe this becomes an optional setting, similar to how WiFi networks have optional 're-connect' feature, as maybe not everyone will want this. But if there was an optional "Reconnect to Host Session on network failure" option, then couldn't ST then manage these network connection issues automatically? This would make a HUGE difference to me and my band's user experience with ST.