music monkey.

Verizon came recently to instal FiOS Television at my house and inisisted on removing my Linksys WRT54G running Tomato (v1.06.0981) or their Set Top Boxes won’t have On Demand or Guide Data. I agreed to let them install their router and figured I’ll just put the Linksys back on later. After scratching my head for a few minutes (ok, a few hours.) I figured out how to configure their ActionTec router and how to hook everything up.

Note this is ONLY for Cat5 installs of FiOS. If you have a MoCA (Coax only) install, I’ve heard you can call Verizon and ask them to disable MoCA and enable the Ethernet port on your ONT for your router. I’d recommend this action personally.

First off, Start by connecting a computer to the LAN port of the ActionTec directly. Once you’ve done that, reset the router to factory defaults (Hold in the power button for 30ish seconds and let it reboot.)

Now navigate to the routers configuration page by going to http://192.168.1.1

You’ll be greeted with a ugly login page similar to this one.

The login details should be the following. User Name “admin” Password “password” (No quotes)

If you’ve successfully logged in the router will now ask you to change your login information, so choose whatever login and password you want

Now you’re in the ActionTec’s administration panel. (Isn’t it ugly and disorganized?)

Begin by clicking the “My Network” icon.

and you’ll be brought to the above page. Now click the link on the left hand side called “Network Connections”

…And you’ll be brought to this mess.

Click the top connection “Network (Home/Office)” to get to the properties page.

…and click the “Settings” button.

Now make the next page look like this. (Change IP’s accordingly and yes DNS server IS empty.)

Ok, now your router is almost ready to go. Back on your Network Connections page, click the Advanced >> buttons and more connections will appear. Disable the following connections. Broadband Connection (Ethernet), WAN PPPOE, WAN PPPOE 2 (if it’s already disabled, leave it disabled)

When you’re done it should look like this.

At this point you can now disable the Wireless Network in the Wireless Settings page. I didn’t need to have the ActionTec provide wireless as I have the Linksys doing part of the house and an Apple Airport Express doing the rest. But if you want to enable it, by all means go for it.

Ok your ActionTec router is ready to go. Disconnect the computer connected to the ActionTec router and switch to the Linksys. Log into your linksys and change the router to connect by PPPoE For the Login and Password I used the Verizon account I created (I hear verizonfios / password work as well, if you don’t remember your login) This is how it looks on my router.

Once you’ve done this, make sure you can reach Google.com and other sites.

If it works, great! You’re almost done.

Now you’re going to want to configure your network similar to this..

Once you’ve done that, make sure the ActionTec can still get to the internet. Plug a computer into the ActionTec and see if you can get to Google.com and a few others. If it works, great!

Now you’ll have to pull power out of your STB’s and power them up again so they can fetch new IP addresses from the Linksys. For this I just unplugged one and made sure it worked first (Let it set the clock, Grab guide data, and checked Video On Demand, before going to the rest.) If you have VOD and Guide Data on one, go to the rest and powercycle them all.

Welp, you’re done. The ActionTec router is now behind the Linksys router and the ActionTec is just providing internet to the Set Top Boxes.

Hope this guide helped, if you have any questions/comments post a comment.