Achhina's Digital Garden

2026-06-20 PS5 Wi-Fi Drops and Verizon Router Cleanup

4 min read

2026-06-20 PS5 Wi-Fi Drops and Verizon Router Cleanup

What I set out to do

Figure out why the PS5 kept losing internet — Wi-Fi stayed “connected” but showed no internet, and the only fix was disconnecting and reconnecting. Ended up doing a full pass through the Verizon router admin.

How we did it (method)

Logged into the router admin (192.168.1.1, Verizon CR1000A, firmware 3.6.0.3_BD) and drove it through the Playwright MCP against my already-logged-in session. Notes on the tooling, since this took a few tries:

  • open http://192.168.1.1 just opened my default browser (Firefox) — Claude could screenshot it (read-only, computer-use “read” tier) but not click.
  • Claude-in-Chrome extension wasn’t connected, so that path was out.
  • Playwright initially failed on the router’s self-signed cert (ERR_CERT_AUTHORITY_INVALID) and a fresh Playwright session has no login. Once I logged into the router inside the Playwright browser, Claude could navigate + click everything itself.
  • Router session times out after ~10 min idle; had to re-login once mid-session.
  • Device/Wi-Fi names can’t contain spaces (router strips them) — hyphens are fine.

What we actually did

The fix for the PS5:

  • Disabled SON (Self-Organizing Network) under Advanced → Wi-Fi → Primary Network. SON = Verizon’s band-steering that puts 2.4/5/6 GHz under one SSID and auto-moves devices; the PS5 handled the band switches badly (stayed associated but lost the data path). Kept all three bands on the same name FUBAR per my choice.
  • After disabling, the PS5 immediately re-associated on 5 GHz, 802.11ax, 1201 Mbps, RSSI −50 — strong, full-speed link.

Plex / DNS rebind:

  • System log showed possible DNS-rebind attack detected: ...plex.direct — the router’s DNS Rebind Protection was blocking Plex’s local connections to the Mac (192.168.1.192:32400).
  • Fix: added a surgical rebind exception for 192.168.1.0/24 (Custom private IP range) instead of disabling protection globally. Keeps protection on for 10.x / 172.16.x / loopback. Ties into the Persist qBittorrent UPnP Port Mapping in Media Stack media-stack work.

Checks (all healthy, no change needed):

  • Firmware 3.6.0.3_BD is current; CR1000A auto-updates, no manual update in UI.
  • Firewall: Normal security (IPv4 + IPv6). DHCP lease 24h. UPnP on with auto-cleanup. SIP ALG already disabled (irrelevant anyway — FaceTime/WhatsApp/Discord don’t use SIP).
  • Port forwarding: only a UPnP-created Plex rule (22518 → Mac:32400) + two harmless router-internal loopback rules.

Device inventory cleanup (named everything, fixed types):

  • PS5, Echo (Amazon Echo Dot), ShellyPlug, BrotherPrinter, Living-Room (corrected type to Apple TV / tvOS — router had mislabeled it iPhone/iPad).
  • Work ThinkPad split into Hammerkop (Intel Wi-Fi ec:4c:8c…) and PluggableDock (wired virtual MAC 02:01:00:af:4e:03). Identified via MAC OUI lookup (ec:4c:8c = Intel → ThinkPad’s Wi-Fi).
  • Removed the stale …4e:01 offline entry surgically (avoided “Clear list” so named offline devices kept their names).

IoT network: renamed the existing isolated SSID to FUBAR-IoT (2.4 GHz) for segmenting Echo/Shelly later. Moving devices onto it is a device-side step; flagged that the Shelly may lose local control if isolated.

What was striking

  • The single-SSID band-steering being the culprit, not signal or the ISP line — internet (v4+v6) was solid the whole time.
  • Confirmed the PS5 is a standard model, not a Pro, two ways: it connects as Wi-Fi 6 (no 6 GHz), and the Gmail receipt showed a PlayStation Direct order from Nov 2022 (“PlayStation®5 Console – God of War Ragnarök Bundle”, $559.99) — the Pro didn’t exist until Nov 2024. So 6 GHz is irrelevant to it; 5 GHz is its best band.

Top 3 follow-ups

  1. Watch the PS5 over the next day to confirm the SON fix actually stopped the drops (DHCP log showed it pulling a fresh lease at 15:47 — could be a wake-from-rest, could be a drop).
  2. Verify Plex now streams LAN/direct (not Relay) from the rebind exception.
  3. Optionally move Echo (and test Shelly) onto FUBAR-IoT.

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