Carol’s Vault

I use my laptop as the xboxlive router i could connect to friends games fine but a few das ago when i invite a friend or they invite me to a game it will not let me any help

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the tip. UPnP can be an issue but i believe it is enabled by default. Glad it worked for you though.

I had this problem with 1 or 2 of my friends and after trying all this it still did not work but i did the xbox live test which sugested enabling UPnP which solved the problem straight away so that might help you guys

hey i have this problem too i opened My NAT settings and everything and it still wont let me join my friends its very frustrating so what do i do? do need better internet? or have a wired connection? or what?

I\ve tried almost everything, lets hope this thread is still active.

Ok, there are three guys each with an xbox.
All of us are running our xbox through a computer so we can pick up the wireless signal.

My housemate Josh and I are having problems connecting to each others games, although we can both connect to our fellow housemate Andrew (who lives downstairs)
In order for josh and i to play we have to have andrew set up a room and we join him.

what could cause this problem?
being as how we’re all on the same router.
could it be a Vista issue seeing as how the downstairs computer is the only one still running XP.

Just an update on my situation. My friend and I that live in the same town with the same ISP could not play against each other…see post above.

Well I am using an old Linksys game adaptor that connects wirelessly to my linksys router. I really thought it might be the router causing the problem. Turns out it was the linksys game adaptor. I recently attached my xbox 360 directly to my router and my friend and I were able to play. Not sure why the adaptor causes a problem, but it did.

Hey can anyone help i try to send an invite to friends to join private chat and it says cannot join could be due to network problems or something can anyone email me any suggestions my email (nathandolan1184@hotmail.co.uk)

Thanks

Okay, I play Rainbow 6: Vegas and I can’t connect to this certain friend of mine who plays as well. Neither of us get errors with our NAT, apparently they’re open. I’ve tried every little thing (combinations of opening DMZ, forwarding ports, and enabling UPnP on both my router and my dsl settings) and we still can’t connect to eachother. Can’t even private chat…

Any pointers?

Okay, I play Rainbow 6: Vegas and I can’t connect to this certain friend of mine who plays as well. Neither of us get errors with our NAT, apparently they’re open. I’ve tried every little thing (combinations of opening DMZ, forwarding ports, and enabling UPnP on both my router and my dsl settings) and we still can’t connect to eachother. Can’t even private chat…

Any pointers?

me and my friend keep trying to party up but even when both of our NAT’s are open it still says it cant connect because the “networks may be incompatible, your NAT is set to open which is the most compatible…” plz help none of the xbox support was relevent.

me and my friend keep trying to party up but even when both of our NAT’s are open it still says it cant connect because the “networks may be incompatible, your NAT is set to open which is the most compatible…” plz help none of the xbox support was relevent.

I had the same problem of not being able to connect to one person but being able to connect to everyone else. The way that we fixed it was both of us setting our IP config to automatic.

Im having trouble joining my cousins party. Every time they send me an invite it says cant connect to host. And thats before the game starts. So its not that its full. its in the lobby before joining a game. but when my brother plays we can all play in the same party when he sends invites. He uses the wireless router and i use the cable.And we both use the same IP. Would the problem be me disconnecting the cable or my 360 every day? Please help. Thanks.

I have one friend who i really wanna play with, but i cant. I can play with everyone on my friend list but him, though its possible that there is one more person this happens with, though i havent actually tried to join his games more than once. We cant do private chat and can only sometimes join the same game if somone else hosts it(when we did that in call of duty 4, the game just started getting really laggy) and on the rare occasion that we can both join a game that someone has hosted, we cant hear eachother when we talk. I pretty much can only text message him on xbox live. Now that we recently got Left 4 Dead, when i try to join his game it says there were network problems, or when i look at his lobby, it says he is in an unjoinable game(though i should be able to join his game, its not full or anything). I dont know what to do cause my NAT is open, and his NAT is moderate and even sometimes open. I have a hard wire connection and so does he. I dont really know what could be wrong. Any help??

Oh not now, i changed my ip adress and stuff, and now it works, i’ll come if i need more help though

Hey, i can chat with anyone i want to and my cousin can to, but when we try to chat with each other, it wont work. I dont really know what to ask, so..any suggestions on what to do to resolve this issue…?

Thanks, Jim.
Let me know something.

Ok thanks for your help, my brother works in a computer shop so we should be able to get a new wire fairly easily and I’ll ask my friend now, I’ll let you know if and how I get it fixed and see if it helps other people too, thanks again!

Ok thanks for your help, my brother works in a computer shop so we should be able to get a new wire fairly easily and I’ll ask my friend now, I’ll let you know if and how I get it fixed and see if it helps other people too, thanks again!

Oh damn! I really hoped that this will work.
One more suggestion…Can you ask one of your friends to remove you from his friends list and add you again?
Also, try hooking your 360 directly to the modem.
If possible, if you have an extra internet cable that is, try replacing the cable and see what happens.

Sorry i can’t help you more, Jim. I really do my best here and i don’t get it why most of you can’t have it fixed.
I fixed mine without too many headaches.

Let me know, will you…

I’ve cleared the cache by doing what you asked but unfortunately I’m still having the same problem, I’m not too sure what is going on but I can join games and connect to Xbox Live with everyone bar people on my friends list. I shall try again though! thanks for the quick reply as well! I’ll repost when I’ve tried all suggestions

Zack, i don’t think the school’s connection has anything to do with this and since it is open, it shouldn’t be a problem.
I just need to know if you guys could play together before. I also need to know if you both use the same ISP.
Let me know.

Jim, do me a favor and do something that i haven’t asked anyone here yet: clear the cache on your 360.
You won’t lose any game-saves and the worse can happen is that you’ll have to download some of your maps again.
Do as following:
Go to your Dashboard, System , Memory and then Hard Drive.
Highlight the hard drive and press Y for the options.
Now press X, X, LB, RB, X, X.
Now confirm the system maintenance and follow the steps on the screen.
Restart your 360 and try connecting to a friend with whom you couldn’t connect before.

Please, if it works, let us know.
The reason i am advising you to do this is because you said you tried everything else.

Hi, I’m having the same problem as many of the people on here, but I’ve tried everything stated but still have no luck. I can join online games without any friends fine, for instance I can play Fifa 09 with random people, but as soon as I try to play with a friend nothing will work, this is the same with COD4. My NAT settings are open, whereas my friends is set to moderate, but this isn’t a problem for another one of my friends as his is also set to Open and can still connect to the moderate NAT type.
We do not have a wireless connection as it is connected by a cable and the problem has only occured recently, I would be very grateful if you could help solve this issue!
Thanks
P.s. I also got an email back from the xbox support service exactly the same as yours apart from a different sender.

Hi, I’m having the same problem as many of the people on here, but I’ve tried everything stated but still have no luck. I can join online games without any friends fine, for instance I can play Fifa 09 with random people, but as soon as I try to play with a friend nothing will work, this is the same with COD4. My NAT settings are open, whereas my friends is set to moderate, but this isn’t a problem for another one of my friends as his is also set to Open and can still connect to the moderate NAT type.
We do not have a wireless connection as it is connected by a cable and the problem has only occured recently, I would be very grateful if you could help solve this issue!
Thanks
P.s. I also got an email back from the xbox support service exactly the same as yours apart from a different sender.

I’m having the same problem with a couple of friends. We are both in college (not at the same school), and we can’t connect to each other, but we can connect through another friend and then everything is fine. The only problem with that is we need to have someone who we can both connect to on all the time, which isn’t realistic. Both our NATs are open and I don’t know much about routers but I’m pretty sure I don’t have my own since I run through the school’s connection. Please help!

My friend and I have the same problem. We both live in the same town with the same ISP. I can’t join a hosted game (Tiger Woods 09) by him and he can’t join a hosted game by me, but we can both join a hosted game from a mutual friend that has a different ISP. Only problem then is, we still can’t talk to each other. We can talk and hear eveyone else that are on different ISP’s.

I am on a Linksys router and my friend is not. I personally think this has something to do with Xbox Live or the game thinking we are the same person since our DSL modem’s may be giving out similar IP’s, but that is just a theory. Unfortunately, I don’t have a solution, and I am yet to find one that fixes the problem. However, it does appear to be happening to a lot of people on the same ISP.

Gillam, i don’t think your problem is related to this.
Can you check the family settings on your dashboard?
See if there are any restrictions.

This is the only thing i can think of.

hello, can anyone help me? I am playing fifa 08 on xbox 360 online and I am unable to invite a friend to a game. I can send messages etc and if somebody invites me to a game I can accept and it’s fine. The only problem I have is that the “invite friend to a game” section is “greyed” out. I have been through the NAT settings and they show open. It may only be something trivial so if anyone can help I’d appreciate it. The router I am using is connected directly to the xbox.

thanks

paul

Dave and Kevin,

I am really sorry you guys can get this one fixed.
What’s annoying is that i can’t figure out why isn’t working for you.

Every now and then, when we boot up a game, we get those game updates and maybe there is the issue.

Let’s look at this from another perspective.
I see lots of complains about this when people play certain games.

Can you guys tell me what games you’re playing and if you have had any updates for it?
Did your chats go well before?

Might be the hardware, might be the ISP…
This case is about connecting to each other, so i am looking at the ISP…but…

Can you take your xBox’s and try connecting from a friend’s home, or even your neighbor?
If it works, then is the ISP – regarding your account with them.
If not, then is a hardware or power problem.

So far i am a bit out of suggestions and will call MS myself, but i don’t think they will help me that much.

So do one last try and this one will tell us where the problem is.
Please let me know how it works and i will pick it up from there.

Carol, thanks for all the tips above. My friend and I have been having some of the same issues as descibed above. We both live in the same town and use the same ISP (Cox) and neither one of us can host a game or connect with voice chat. When someone else hosts a game it is fine. I have tried all the above mentioned ideas. I have had my xbox on static with ports open and so has he. We have tried both with static and 1 with static, none of which worked. In all tries both our NATs read OPEN. I currently have a Linksys WRT54G and downgraded the firmware to 3.03.6 which xbox.com says is compatible and it still does not work. I am at a loss here as what to do. Do you think it has something to do with the ISP or is it our individual routers/modems. We have called customer service of all companies (Microsoft, Linksys, Cox) and each one just tosses the blame. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Update:

I tried portforward’s method. DID NOT WORK.

I assigned myself a static IP and opened my ports. I even disabled my UPnP. No luck.

I have tried absolutely everything. My friend has done the same and we still cannot host a private chat or party together in a game.

What other options do I have?

I am having the same problem with not being able to join games or have private chats with friends in my same city with the same ISP.

And yes, my friends and my NAT is set to OPEN.

I have talked to customer support of Xbox Live, my ISP (Cox Communications, and my router company (Lynksys).

I have opened up the Xbox Live ports I was given by Xbox live and opened them how Lynksys told me. Still doesn’t work.

But…Lynksys and Portforwarding.com had me opening the ports differently. I have not tried opening the ports the way Portforwarding wants me to do it. I will go back and try that.

Does anyone have any other suggestions if this doesn’t work?

The whole point of buying an Xbox 360 was to play with these two friends. I will regret the purchase if I can’t get it to work.

I am having the same problem with not being able to join games or have private chats with friends in my same city with the same ISP.

And yes, my friends and my NAT is set to OPEN.

I have talked to customer support of Xbox Live, my ISP (Cox Communications, and my router company (Lynksys).

I have opened up the Xbox Live ports I was given by Xbox live and opened them how Lynksys told me. Still doesn’t work.

But…Lynksys and Portforwarding.com had me opening the ports differently. I have not tried opening the ports the way Portforwarding wants me to do it. I will go back and try that.

Does anyone have any other suggestions if this doesn’t work?

The whole point of buying an Xbox 360 was to play with these two friends. I will regret the purchase if I can’t get it to work.

There is no other way of getting to them other than calling them. Even then the support is flaky on most issues. It is pot luck whether you get a support monkey who knows what they are talking about.

There is no other way of getting to them other than calling them. Even then the support is flaky on most issues. It is pot luck whether you get a support monkey who knows what they are talking about.

Vinny, the point of the tutorial was to set it from strict to open or at least moderate.
Did you reverted?

Vanessa, this is a strange one and i can’t really advice you on that.
Maybe your ISP is doing maintenance, but i don’t suppose they do that every evening.
What kind of router do you have?

Becks, besides the calls i had with the support team, about 5 times, i can’t seem to find another way getting to them.

If this is a default answer they use, then we must find another way to get to them.
Any ideas?

Hi Carol,

That email support sent you, they sent me exactly the same one on three different issues.

Email support is totally non existant, and they just send that template to everyone.

Hi Carol,

That email support sent you, they sent me exactly the same one on three different issues.

Email support is totally non existant, and they just send that template to everyone.

Hi Carol,

That email support sent you, they sent me exactly the same one on three different issues.

Email support is totally non existant, and they just send that template to everyone.

Hi, Every night around 9:00 my Xbox disconnects itself somehow and i have to wait for about 15 minutes to sign back on. But when I am able to sign back on it wont let me chat or join games. Its wierd because during the day I have no problems chatting or joining games but as soon as 9:00 rolls around its KaBoom for the XBOX. My dad has changed the IP address but it still doesnt work.

Thanks
Vanessa

ha my nat was open but i still couldnt play with my friends so i did everything you said to do with the manual and now my nat is strict

Hi all and so sorry for the late reply.

Alex, you are losing packs on your network. That causes the lag and the red dots or yellow ones pointing out that you have a bad ping to the others or they can’t reach you that well.

Kevin, the only thing i can recommend in your case is to buy a hub or just borrow one and test it.
Hookup your cable from your xbox to it, and from the hub to your modem or what you’re using.
Try and see what happens.
Let me know if it makes any difference.

Joab, you can find the NAT settings by accessing the control panel of your router via your browser.
You can do that by accessing the IP address of your router, which you can find on your installation cd or your instructions manual.

Once in, depending on the hardware you have, look up into Tools or Settings.

If you’re still stuck, use the contact form and send me a mail. I will help you further.

Hi, I have been having this trouble and I have been able too point it down to being mine (or perhaps his) NAT but i search through my computer and yet can still not find the place to change it. Could you please help me (I am usually good on computers but now…).

Btw: I have a wireless router and i know it is adaptable to XBL
Ty,

Hi, I have been having this trouble and I have been able too point it down to being mine (or perhaps his) NAT but i search through my computer and yet can still not find the place to change it. Could you please help me (I am usually good on computers but now…).

Btw: I have a wireless router and i know it is adaptable to XBL
Ty,

whenever i send a invite to join a game or a private chat invite to my friend it says cannot connect to host and for the private chat it says joining chat for him and mines says invite sent wenever he clicks accept chat and we still arent able to talk and vice versa, i have wireless internet and he has connected our NAT is open and i dont know what to do please help

whenever i send a invite to join a game or a private chat invite to my friend it says cannot connect to host and for the private chat it says joining chat for him and mines says invite sent wenever he clicks accept chat and we still arent able to talk and vice versa, i have wireless internet and he has connected our NAT is open and i dont know what to do please help

Hey, I was wondering if you can help me figure out why every time I play COD 4( and most of my games, but I only say that cuz that’s basically the only game I play now) my internet connection is always the slowest one and many times I get the “Connection Interrupted” message in the middle of a game and the whole game(session) ends, but sometimes its just me that gets kicked out and my friends are still in playing. Also, I don’t remember the last game that I didn’t have a “Lag” (but once every blue moon I’m the only one with perfect connection and the whole room (at least 5-8 more people) has a horrible “Lag”. Also, sometimes it takes a long time to join party’s to start a game, but usually it gets through after a while.

-I have a basically new Netgear router and I’m connected with a wire so I know it’s not the wireless problem.
-My NAT is set to open so i know thats not the problem.
-My internet connection on my computer I’d say is better than average, so I know that’s not the problem.

The only thing I can think of that could be an issue is the fact that I live in Argentina now, (had to move wit my dad cuz of his job) but I’m still not convinced cuz I’ve played with people in Europe and their connection is still good.

But the thing is, I never played COD 4 in Miami(where I used to live) so I dont know how it played there but I did play COD 3 and many times I couldn’t enter games cuz I “Could not connect to host” but i don’t remember too much “Lagging” in that game. So once again, I don’t know if it’s just the fact that I live in Argentina or what.????

thanks

microsoft.com@ Zack – I don’t know what the deal is exactly, but is worth having a look if your NAT is open on the router’s config. settings.
If it is set to Strict, open it.

@Trey – You might want to take a look at the speed of your connection provided by your new ISP.
You’re either losing packets of data through the network
or your friend is encountering this problem.

Is your friend having this issue only with your brother or is this happening with his other friends?

This might be silly, the voice thing, but can your brother see if by mistake has blocked the voice chat with that friend?

I once put one of my friend’s voice off by mistake and for a week i had no idea why i couldn’t hear him.

For both of you, it is worth checking the wireless frequency as well.
Most routers have channels 1 to 11, maybe more.
Make sure your chosen channel is not interfering with one of your neighbors.

Here’s a nice walkthru: Wireless tips.

The default chosen channel is 11. Try any of the other and see how your connection behaves.
Just try not being on the same channel as someone living next to you.

This are simple things to check, so if yo have time, do this.

microsoft.com@ Zack – I don’t know what the deal is exactly, but is worth having a look if your NAT is open on the router’s config. settings.
If it is set to Strict, open it.

@Trey – You might want to take a look at the speed of your connection provided by your new ISP.
You’re either losing packets of data through the network
or your friend is encountering this problem.

Is your friend having this issue only with your brother or is this happening with his other friends?

This might be silly, the voice thing, but can your brother see if by mistake has blocked the voice chat with that friend?

I once put one of my friend’s voice off by mistake and for a week i had no idea why i couldn’t hear him.

For both of you, it is worth checking the wireless frequency as well.
Most routers have channels 1 to 11, maybe more.
Make sure your chosen channel is not interfering with one of your neighbors.

Here’s a nice walkthru: Wireless tips.

The default chosen channel is 11. Try any of the other and see how your connection behaves.
Just try not being on the same channel as someone living next to you.

This are simple things to check, so if yo have time, do this.

microsoft.com@ Zack – I don’t know what the deal is exactly, but is worth having a look if your NAT is open on the router’s config. settings.
If it is set to Strict, open it.

@Trey – You might want to take a look at the speed of your connection provided by your new ISP.
You’re either losing packets of data through the network
or your friend is encountering this problem.

Is your friend having this issue only with your brother or is this happening with his other friends?

This might be silly, the voice thing, but can your brother see if by mistake has blocked the voice chat with that friend?

I once put one of my friend’s voice off by mistake and for a week i had no idea why i couldn’t hear him.

For both of you, it is worth checking the wireless frequency as well.
Most routers have channels 1 to 11, maybe more.
Make sure your chosen channel is not interfering with one of your neighbors.

Here’s a nice walkthru: Wireless tips.

The default chosen channel is 11. Try any of the other and see how your connection behaves.
Just try not being on the same channel as someone living next to you.

This are simple things to check, so if yo have time, do this.

Please bare with me since as I attempt to explain this. We recently switched our internet service provider and it comes wireless bridging or something similar in that area. Right when we switched, my younger brother started coming across a problem connecting with his friend. Looking into the problem, we came across that his NAT was reading, strict. After a day of touble, we opened the ports, our router is compatible, we set the static IP/DNS/Subnet, so we finally read open. However, he still cannot play with his friend. Their Xbox reads Moderate so my younger brother cannot play with his friend as long as his friend is hosting. He cannot hear or be heard while using voice communication and we already know that if anything, it is most likely them. But their parents do not want to deal with fixing his friend’s Xbox.Is there a way to make ourselves compatible with his friend so that they are able to play properly together? Would we have to make ourself moderate?

me and a few of my friends cant chat adn join each others games since i got a wireless router the guy at the game store said thats not a problem i mean whats the deal

Billy, have you tried any of the above solutions?

Me and my friend on xbox live can’t connect either. We can’t go into private chat or join a game unless someone else is hosting it.

Me and my friend on xbox live can’t connect either. We can’t go into private chat or join a game unless someone else is hosting it.

No, it is only him. I will ask him, and I will tell him to forward his ports, Thanks

Chase, if your settings are like you say, then maybe something happened to the settings on your friend’s side.
Ask him about this.
Are you having this issue with one person only, or with more?

I can’t join my friend, but I could until about 2 weeks ago, my NAT is open and I have the ports for LIVE forwarded, Any help?

Hi Noodles,
Can you and your friend reset your IP addresses and try again?
Try that in your router’s configuration panel.

What’s his modem’s brand name?

my friend has just brought a new modem box top of the range his nat type is set to open, and likewise mine is as well set to open. but however unfortunately we cannot connect to each others hosted games of invite each other can anyone help me?

my friend has just brought a new modem box top of the range his nat type is set to open, and likewise mine is as well set to open. but however unfortunately we cannot connect to each others hosted games of invite each other can anyone help me?

The nasties i was referring to will happen only if you play around with the DMZ.
The UpNp must be open for gaming and it’s not being considered a risk.

This is a hint from my router’s hints section:

UPnP helps other UPnP LAN hosts interoperate with the router. Leave the UPnP option enabled as long as the LAN has other UPnP applications.

This means that in order to be able to reach other’s networks, this has to be enabled.
You can find this option somewhere under advanced networking.

The nasties i was referring to will happen only if you play around with the DMZ.
The UpNp must be open for gaming and it’s not being considered a risk.

This is a hint from my router’s hints section:

UPnP helps other UPnP LAN hosts interoperate with the router. Leave the UPnP option enabled as long as the LAN has other UPnP applications.

This means that in order to be able to reach other’s networks, this has to be enabled.
You can find this option somewhere under advanced networking.

Great, I will give it a try and comment back. But will leaving the uPnP ON give security problems? You mentioned opening his computer up to nasties!

Great, I will give it a try and comment back. But will leaving the uPnP ON give security problems? You mentioned opening his computer up to nasties!

Turning the UpNp on should turn the NAT on.
If you’ve got access to the control panel, then he should do that and then try joining a game.

Jim and Tom are using a Netgear FVS318v3. Apparently turning the uPnP on changed the NAT to open, but we have not tried it officially to see if that worked. What would you recommend?

Ben, the reason Tom gets booted off is because his NAT is set on strict.
For gaming purposes, this has to be set up to open or else lots of packs will be lost on the network causing his falls.

There is one method, but i don’t recommend it for security purposes, as it will make his computer an easy target to web “nasties”.

What kind of router is he having?

Well just occured because one member is new. So Jim and Tom have their NAT to strict (same router). Mine is open. We can all sucessfully play free mode in GTA, but if we join the general lobby Tom gets booted. He hears the audio of the lobby, then gets a disconnect. Never gets signed out of xbox live though. Probably because other routers are involved. We are changing router options to try to get it to be open. Any other thoughts while we go through this? Its just odd!

Well just occured because one member is new. So Jim and Tom have their NAT to strict (same router). Mine is open. We can all sucessfully play free mode in GTA, but if we join the general lobby Tom gets booted. He hears the audio of the lobby, then gets a disconnect. Never gets signed out of xbox live though. Probably because other routers are involved. We are changing router options to try to get it to be open. Any other thoughts while we go through this? Its just odd!

Hi Ben,

This thread is still active and it will stay active.
I have a question for you….Did they have this problem before or it just occurred recently?

Good luck to you!

Is this tread still active? I am having similar issues. To make things easy, we have Matt, Tom, Jim, and Ben (me). Tom and Matt cannot connect but any 3 combination otherwise is just fine! To make it more odd, Jim and Tom are on the same router with 2 xboxes(roomates). I am going to immediately forward this linke to everyone to make sure settings are correct! Thanks.

Is this tread still active? I am having similar issues. To make things easy, we have Matt, Tom, Jim, and Ben (me). Tom and Matt cannot connect but any 3 combination otherwise is just fine! To make it more odd, Jim and Tom are on the same router with 2 xboxes(roomates). I am going to immediately forward this linke to everyone to make sure settings are correct! Thanks.

Please help.. me and my m8 live close to each other in the uk both have open nats and the same internet provider bt we can individually connect and play games and talk to our other mates but we cant connect play or talk to each other any ideas regards im using a bt home hub

Branden, you might want to have a look through the comments.
Some of them are really useful.
See if you find something, if not, let me know.

Bryant, that’s the trick that did it for me. I bet if others will try it, they’ll have their issue fixed.

Joe, try a total reset of your router and try again. You might want to test the speed of your network as well to make sure you are not losing packs.

Michael, at this very moment, there are only couple of things i know that might fix this issue.
1- put your 360 on static IP ot port forwarding.
2- Change your router or get an extra hub and hook up your 360′s cable to it. That should do it.

Me and my friend can’t connect to each other and we both have open NAT’s he lives close to me and it’s the only person it happends with, can you help please?

In October we had this problem, too–could connect to Xbox Live & chat but couldn’t join in or host any games. Had been working fine for months prior to that. The Xbox 360 console said the NAT was open, we’re using a wireless router & we hadn’t changed any of our settings. It took a couple of phone calls and an e-mail, but it turns out that it was something with our ISP’s settings. ISP tech support made some change to our internet service & now everything works again. We don’t know if there was port blocking going on (our ISP says there was not) or what caused the problem with our service, but some ISP’s do engage in port blocking, & if ports 88 or 3074 are blocked by an ISP, Xbox Live Gold services would be blocked.

I turned my router off and on today because the internet has been slow and now I cannot connect to my friend in games or chat. This has never happened before when I have done this and I’ve done it a fair few times. Tips?

i used to have the same problem as you guys… but ever since i started using a hub it has all went away… it has to do with having a direct connection to your router, because some routers aren’t compatible with other routers. maybe this only worked for me but thought i would try and help

Hi, My NAT says open but when I try to find games on Gears of War and Halo 3 it takes along time to find them, also I just changed my NAT to open by setting the IP address to Automatic in the Network Settings. I know it isn’t my internet connenection because I always test that. Does my problem have anything to do with NAT settings because i have read somewhere that his xbox misread his NAT settings??

Hi, My NAT says open but when I try to find games on Gears of War and Halo 3 it takes along time to find them, also I just changed my NAT to open by setting the IP address to Automatic in the Network Settings. I know it isn’t my internet connenection because I always test that. Does my problem have anything to do with NAT settings because i have read somewhere that his xbox misread his NAT settings??

if theres a lab top on the router to can that mess up my connection?

@Jason – Falling of a game is a known issue with GRAW2 and Rainbow Six Vegas.

The ideal number of players is 6 on both of them.

I could ask around and see if some of my friends fixed their problems and how, but i am sure that the Customer Service can’t help us much on this one.

@ Josh – Your computer has an IP of course, and it shouldn’t interfere with the IP you use for your 360. Therefore, pay attention to that or you’ll have an IP conflict.
If you get disconnected because there are too many players on a game, then your connection can’t handle it.
As for dropping of because of the voice, i don’t know how we can fix that.

Before the game starts, ask everyone to mute their mics and see what happens.

My boyfriend had a similar problem with his friends, and i had no problem anymore, while playing on the same 360.
After replacing my router, there was no problem anymore.

ok i did the port fowarding, got a static ip,and i was wondering if my computer has an ip address so should i just use that one.

but the only problem is when theres 9 people playing and when im talking i still get that annoying message that says the game session is no longer available then disconnects from live.

Same issue here, however me and the friend in question have tried every router setting, and then skipped routers altogether and gone for direct modem connection, still no go. Works fine if I go to his place and set up on his router etc (even had a 8 man game hosted on GRAW2 and we were both supposed to be on strict NATs!?).
I suppose it’s possible one of us has a modem thats on its way to the graveyard, but I’m stumped otherwise.
Oh and both Xbox Live Customer Service and my ISP Customer Service were brough a new meanin to the word ‘useless’.

im using a wirless gateway

You don’t have to do anything to your computer, Josh.

Is all on the 360 dashboard, on the Network Settings, and if you don’t know how to do it, ask a friend to do that for you, otherwise i will make a step by step tutorial for you, with pictures as well.

Just let me know.

Now…are you using a wireless router?

i havent tried the steps yet becuase im not that good with computers and i dont want to mess around with the computer but does it really do anything to the computer?

i havent tried the steps yet becuase im not that good with computers and i dont want to mess around with the computer but does it really do anything to the computer?

@Josh – I had the same problem and fixed it with the steps i wrote above in the entry.

In many cases, is the host who is having this issue and you can’t connect to him.
Have you tried fixing it the way i did?

hi i was just wondering if you can help me with my problem, my nat says open but when i try to join a game it says the game is no longer available then about 5 seconds later i get disconnected,ive got a cg814wg v2 gateway and my internet provider is comcast so i was curoius if it was just comcast or the gateway so can you help me please.

Is your friend’s NAT that has to be opened, Barlow.
You don’t need to do anything, until he opens his. If the problem is not solved, you can try a router reset.

Is your friend’s NAT that has to be opened, Barlow.
You don’t need to do anything, until he opens his. If the problem is not solved, you can try a router reset.

my NAT says open but i cant talk with a friend who has moderate NAT. Is it my NAT or his and even though mine says open should I do this?

my NAT says open but i cant talk with a friend who has moderate NAT. Is it my NAT or his and even though mine says open should I do this?

Hi Jeremy,

Is possible that i might be also the one who took you off the list, because i had to do few good cleanups and removed lots of people with whom i wasn’t playing that much anymore.

Either way, if you have people with whom you’re playing a lot, is no need to add me. Keep on playing with them.

Now, if you say that your friend “loaned” his modem and he’s got this one’s settings on Moderate, then there’s your answer.

He’s the one who has to open up the ports, so please send him to portforward.com and see the settings there.

Good luck and do let us know if he fixes it.

Sorry if I took you off the friends list, it was getting too long, and there were a lot of people on it I didn’t even know. I’ll add your tag. I figured out the problem. If by some chance I’m wrong on this I’ll definitely check out the other stuff here cuz this is all good advice. The instance of this problem that caused me to post was because a friend in the UK (I’m paraphrasing here) “loaned his modem out and started using another one.” I didn’t know he changed his setup from before, and he didn’t tell me until I started asking. His current setup had the NAT set to moderate. (He didn’t know about that stuff so I tried to tell him as best you can sending messages on the 360) Since thats the most common cause of the problem, I’m assuming the problem is on his side of the pond and will disappear once he gets his stuff setup to Open NAT. I also took the time to double check I could invite friends in the US to games and that works just fine. Thanks again for the advice and I’ll bookmark this page for further trouble shooting.

Sorry if I took you off the friends list, it was getting too long, and there were a lot of people on it I didn’t even know. I’ll add your tag. I figured out the problem. If by some chance I’m wrong on this I’ll definitely check out the other stuff here cuz this is all good advice. The instance of this problem that caused me to post was because a friend in the UK (I’m paraphrasing here) “loaned his modem out and started using another one.” I didn’t know he changed his setup from before, and he didn’t tell me until I started asking. His current setup had the NAT set to moderate. (He didn’t know about that stuff so I tried to tell him as best you can sending messages on the 360) Since thats the most common cause of the problem, I’m assuming the problem is on his side of the pond and will disappear once he gets his stuff setup to Open NAT. I also took the time to double check I could invite friends in the US to games and that works just fine. Thanks again for the advice and I’ll bookmark this page for further trouble shooting.

Jeremy,
If your 360 isn’t on static IP, then change that too.
BTW, i think we used to be on each other’s friends list on Live, but i might be wrong.

IF my memory serves me well, i had a RonJeremy on my list.

My gamertag is SweetCarol.

Does this ring any bell?

Jeremy,
If your 360 isn’t on static IP, then change that too.
BTW, i think we used to be on each other’s friends list on Live, but i might be wrong.

IF my memory serves me well, i had a RonJeremy on my list.

My gamertag is SweetCarol.

Does this ring any bell?

Thanks. I’ll try this stuff and also run it by my friends. I do think this has something to do with packet loss. I’m sure one of my friends will get his bandwidth throttled after som much downloading, but I also think he could figure this out by himself and remedy it. I will try the unplug everything approach and see what happens, too. Thanks again for the ideas.

Hi Jeremy,

Look a bit up at Mark’s comment and maybe that will explain a bit about your problem.
Read the others too.
Maybe one will help.

You should also consider asking your friends to check out their routers and setting.
The problem may be on their side.

Did you pay attention to the days when you have this problem?
Is it on the beginning of the month, the end?
Some people have a limited bandwidth in a month, and if their upload bandwidth is low, then problems can occur.

Hi Jeremy,

Look a bit up at Mark’s comment and maybe that will explain a bit about your problem.
Read the others too.
Maybe one will help.

You should also consider asking your friends to check out their routers and setting.
The problem may be on their side.

Did you pay attention to the days when you have this problem?
Is it on the beginning of the month, the end?
Some people have a limited bandwidth in a month, and if their upload bandwidth is low, then problems can occur.

I happened on this site through a google search,and it seems to me that this is as good a place as any to put my question . I am having the same general problem as described above with a few caveats. 1. I am in the US, trying to connect to friends who live in the EU. 2. This problem only occurs randomly, some days it works fine, other times, not at all. 3. This occurs with myself and multiple friends in the EU, so I have no reason to believe there is a configuration issue. I’ve called support, and they weren’t any real help.

Should I just give up and live with it? Is it even worth trying to troubleshoot my setup as well as my friends?I would tend to go with this answer, but maybe someone out there has some genius idea…

Now I will go re-read the article to make sure I didn’t miss anything.

Hi Andrew,

The NAT settings are referring to the port forwarding: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/908874

Basically, you go to Portforward.com and look up your router.
When you find it, then look for the ports that you should forward for your router.

Then log on into your router’s panel and open the ports there.

If you still need help, let me know the exact name of your router and i will help you more.

Hi Andrew,

The NAT settings are referring to the port forwarding: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/908874

Basically, you go to Portforward.com and look up your router.
When you find it, then look for the ports that you should forward for your router.

Then log on into your router’s panel and open the ports there.

If you still need help, let me know the exact name of your router and i will help you more.

i read the thing but i dont know how to change my NAT settings…Cat how do you do it?

Mark, thank you very much for sharing this with us here.
The modem can indeed be the one who’s causing all these troubles.

I have a friend who’s modem and everything else is new, plus a very fast connection and yet, he still has problems.

I have been going through this problem for a while and have gone through numerous router settings (and routers). Even bypassing the router with direct wire to the 360 eventually failed. The only thing that has worked so far is to upgrade my modem. I had an old one that was apparently losing packets according to the guy at Cox Communications. I was having trouble private chatting with a couple of people on my friends list. They couldn’t join games that I hosted and I couldn’t join games that they hosted. I think the reason that it mostly happened with those specific people was that they were on a T1 connection and my modem couldn’t keep up. Since I bought the new modem, I have had no problems. So if you have an old modem, you may want to consider getting a new one and maybe upgrading the speed of your connection if that doesn’t work.

Sorry about your xbox breaking down.
I was about to advice you changing the IP address of your 360, if you use a wireless router for example.

What’s wrong with your machine?

nvm…my xbox broke down

hey, i went to my friends house today and his connection is open.
and we can’t even play with each other. it wont let us join the game if the other is in it.

Hi Matt,
You should ask your friend to check his connection as well.
Do you hear each other when you’re playing?

so me and my friend haven’t been able to connect for the past 2weeks. Is it one of us or both of us because we can still play with our other friends but not each other. (we mostly have the same friends) i fixed my NAT to open and forwarded my ports and i still cant play with him. im guesing its him. =

You would be surprised how many more are facing the same problem, Joey.
I have a couple of friends on Live, that despite everything they’ve tried, they still can’t communicate or play, especially with the people that they were playing with most of the time.

Good luck to you and maybe when you’ll wake up it’ll work.

You would be surprised how many more are facing the same problem, Joey.
I have a couple of friends on Live, that despite everything they’ve tried, they still can’t communicate or play, especially with the people that they were playing with most of the time.

Good luck to you and maybe when you’ll wake up it’ll work.

I actually have the same problem and am shocked to see so many others are suffering as well. My friend an I will unplug everything before bed like you suggested.

Hi Andrew, please let us know if the unplug method helped you in any way.

The problem can occur even with the NAT open in my case as well, and reseting the connection and taking off the wires actually fixed that.

hey yeah this problem started for me 3 days ago and happend to em bout a year ago. last time i got my NAT to open and it worked now my NAT is open and i got the problem again. i’ll try that restarting and unplugging method for a few hours but the 1-800-4MY XBOX number didnt help me at all.

This is a temporary thing to do, Josh. Is not bad. I’ve done it many times and is good to do so once in a while.

You disconnect everything before you go to sleep, for example, and reconnect all the wires and power up when you wake up.
Of course is not possible playing without the wires or getting on.

Try joining your friend’s games or chats after doing that and let me know if it works.
If not, we’ll be looking for another solution.

Please check your bandwidth as well. If you have limited bandwidth in a month from your ISP that can give you troubles too.

how i can get to be able to private chat and join my friends game, is disconnecting everything a bad thing to do

Josh, tell me for what exactly you need the explanation and i will try my best to help you.

Thanx ill do that but how do i solve the problem i need an in depth explanation because im awful on computers

Thanx ill do that but how do i solve the problem i need an in depth explanation because im awful on computers

James, putting your Xbox off and taking off all the wires, including the power cables from your router and everything else, resets your connection.
When i say all wires, i really mean all. From the power to the cables connecting into the back of your 360.

Josh, that’s not a bad thing. Many gamers are doing that.
You should get a little switch though and connect both your computer and 360 at the same time….if you want.

I have the Topcom TSH-205.

I have to disconnect my xbox wire from the internet a lot so i can plug my internet in, i got it all on one modem , is that a bad thing ?

Hi I just started having this problem i was wondering wat u were going to say to josh as my xbox was left unwired 4 a while not long ago

Hi I just started having this problem i was wondering wat u were going to say to josh as my xbox was left unwired 4 a while not long ago

Hi Vic,

Go to your Dlink panel and look for the Tools tab, then look on the menu on the left and choose Misc. There you can enable the Xbox 360 Support (second last setting).
Now go to PortForward.com and enable the ports listed. This is a direct link to your router model.

Let me know if that works for you.

Hi i tried everything excpet the NAT setting, with no luck. I’m using a Dlink 614+ and cannot find the NAT setting on it.

Did you disconnected all wires from your xbox , your internet cable and put everything offline for fews hours?

yes it was fine before, 1st of all it happened on fifa 07 and it was okay on rainbow but now i just cant chat or play my m8 on either

Ok Josh. The fact that you have no wireless, is not a problem.
When did the problem started? Were you able to play and talk with no problem before?

I am not the brightest on the computer u have given a good explanation but i just do not get it i do not have wireless so i dont have 2 worry about that can u explain it step by step 2 me like what i click and stuff because i dont no wa NAT is and stuff

I am not the brightest on the computer u have given a good explanation but i just do not get it i do not have wireless so i dont have 2 worry about that can u explain it step by step 2 me like what i click and stuff because i dont no wa NAT is and stuff

Did you do anything from what i have posted, Josh?

I have my 360 wired up it just messes up any suggestions cant talk or play with mates

I have my 360 wired up it just messes up any suggestions cant talk or play with mates

I have my 360 wired up it just messes up any suggestions cant talk or play with mates

I do, but my ISP keeps changing something to our internet connection which means I need to reconfigure my router. Very annnoying.

Why is it changing? This is so weird. Don’t you save the settings?

Yeah, the NAT settings…. I have to change them all the time, as our router keeps rechanging it. Very annoying.

Good explanation though.