The Reset Button and why you should never, ever push it.

We’ve all seen it.  Lurking over there underneath the router.  Or maybe even on the back, bright red, clearly hiding all the solutions to your internet connection woes.  You think to yourself, why not just push it, what harm could it possibly do.  It couldn’t hurt could it?

I hate to break it to you friends but more times than not, pressing the reset button and resetting your device does hurt.  A lot.  For starters, it will reset your wifi network name and password, which will disconnect all of your wireless devices and if you didn’t end up keeping the little sticker or the little card that came home with your router when you first purchased it, that has the original, factory default wifi network password, you are going to be without connection for a bit.

Even worse, if you don’t have the default password and you only have wireless devices, you are now going to need a computer technician or a friend or friendly neighbor to come over with their laptop  and an Ethernet cable to help you out.  And to further complicate things, many laptops don’t even have Ethernet ports any longer, so a technician may be your only help at this point.

If you thought, that’s not so bad.  I keep all my records.  I have nothing but computers with Ethernet ports and a collection of Ethernet cables so dense the Tropical rainforest called and told you to thin it out.  Don’t get too far ahead of yourself. 

Mac address clones, PPPoE settings, static IP information, and custom DNS settings are all safely stored in that router, keeping you online and the internets internetting.  By resetting your router you wipe all of that crucial information out of your router.  All of which will have to be entered back in by you, with the assistance of an ABC technician of course, but who wants to be on the phone for an hour with one of our techs when you could be streaming the newest episode of Orange is the New Black or eating milk and cookies out on the deck, enjoying the sunshine.  As lovely as our technicians are, I wouldn’t pass up on sunshine cooking eating or binge watching my favourite show just to recite a series of seemingly meaningless numbers into tiny little spots hidden away in the recesses of my router with one of them.  Ever.

But you say, I know all of the information which you have outlined above.  I know the passwords, the static IP info, the DNS settings, my PPPoE username and password etc. etc.  Well then my dear friend, do you have access to our core router would be my last question.  If not, and if there was a mac address clone, then you are once again out of luck and will be needing to call us for help which will take precious time and precious cookies out of your stomach.

If you still think that it might help, it might.  Sometimes it is the last recourse we can take to restore the Internet connection without a replacement router on hand.  Sometimes the router actually just needs it.  But I hope that one thing has become clear.