Computer Shopper - UK (2020-07)

HELPFILE&BUSINESSHELP

ISSUE389|COMPUTER SHOPPER|JULY2020 121

I’mtryingtocoaxafew months longer out ofmyageing Android phone,aMotoG5

Plus. It’s had the last updateIcan expect, to Android 8.1.0. Recently it became critically

low on storage so Ifreed some space by deleting afew apps. While that fixed the issue,

Iseem to have developed aproblem with syncing.

I’ve got two Google accounts on the phone,for personal and work use,and while

the personal account is working fine,I’ve stopped receiving new work emails.

Investigating further,Irealised that my work contacts and calendar appointments had

stopped being updated, too. I’ve also just noticed that Ican’t share images or other

items to my work account’s Google Drive; the folder list isn’tuptodatewith new

folders, and nothing happens if Itry to share the file to an existing folder.

I’ve checkedthe account’ssyncsettings, and each service has an exclamation

mark next to it. At thebottom of the screen, it tells me: “Sync is currently

experiencing problems. It will be working again shortly.”

I’ve tried selecting ‘Sync now’ to forcethe phone to catchup, but after abrief

attempt it just returns to the same state. Canyou help?

Max Moore

Assuming that your work account is accessible fromanother device,such as froma

browser on aPC, it’s probable that your phone’s relationship with it was damaged when you

ran out of space.The easiest and most likely fix is just to remove and re-add the account.

Return to the settings foryour work account, tap the Remove Account button and

accept the warning. While it shouldn’t be necessary,itwon’t hurt to restart the phone after

the account is removed. Once the phone restarts, return to the Users &accounts page in

the Settings menu, scroll down, tap Addaccount and select Google.Authenticateif

prompted, then provide the account details. Yo ushould find that it nowworks properly,

but it’s agood idea to check the Account sync page again to be sure.

Everything butthe sync

WehaveaBTHomeHub5andaNetgear

EX3700rangeextender.TheHomeHubis

inthehallandtheextenderisonthe

landing. The extender connects to the

hub’s wireless network, and all my devices

are connected wirelessly to the extender.

Ilisten to music stored on my computer

using Roon software and my KEFLS50

wireless speakers.

This works fine mostofthe time,but

there are frequent interruptions to our

internet connection. When it goes down, it

interrupts streaming around the house,and

the music stops. Ialso get this issue when

running the Spotify app on my PC and

streaming it to my speakers, even though

Ihavedownloaded the music I’m playing.

The issue has also been known to interrupt

documents as they’re printing.

Ibelieve this problem is something to do

with the BTHome Hub 5but am not certain.

Ipostedtothe Netgear community,which

gives me the impression that most modem/

routers would not have this issue.Please

could you let me know if there’s an

alternative setup that would work better,

ideally without spending toomuchmore?

Tim

This doesn’t sound like an internet issue.Inan

otherwise reliable setup,we’dexpect local

network activity such as printing to continue

even without the internet, unless you’re using

acloud service such as Google Cloud Print.

Unwanted interruption

Having said that, with intermittent

internet service we have

experienced hesitations when

playing downloaded content

on Spotify,soyour connection

could be afactor.

Before replacing any

equipment, we’d be inclined to try

to simplify and troubleshoot your

network. It’s not normal to suffer

repeated broadband losses, so

you might want to check your

phone cabling and socket filters,

and potentially seek support from

BT.Before changing anything, try

manually triggering your issues by

removing the phone cable fromthe

modem. If possible,find a100%

reproducible problemthat you can

use as atest.

If you can’t trigger the problems

you’ve been experiencing by manually

disconnecting the internet, consider

whether theymight in fact stemfromm

alocal factor,such as interference

fromamicrowave or other device.

We’ve certainly experienced issues beefore

whenarouterandrangeextenderhaavveeaa

poor-qualitywirelesslink.

Whether or not you can reproduce the

faults, try simplifying the network. Turn off

the range extender and connect your devices

directly to the Home Hub Wi-Fi; you may

need to reposition them, if only temporarily.

Ifthisdoesn’t work, the issue maylie with the

Home Hub’s wireless network. Try connecting

the range extender and hub using awired

Ethernet cable,then turn offthe Home Hub’s

wireless networking and reconnect your

devices to the range extender’s network.

⬇Range extenders can work

Wi-Fi wonders, but only if

they’ve got adecent signal

⬆Sometimes Android sync problems aren’t temporary.

The fix maybetoremoveand re-add the account