IBAHN aggravation
 

Hello all,

Anytime I stay in a Marriott property in the states with IBAHN internet, I need to call and give them my mac address EACH day for it to work.

I went and talked to the guy at the front desk here and he told me they are tearing out the IBAHN and putting in new infrastructure because of this issue.

Does anyone else have this issue and what is the root cause? I know it has to do with VPNs but what specifically?

Tim

Never heard of this issue... works for me fine (in Europe)...

I had a similar issue at the Marriott in Cologne a few months back. Fixed it by closing my VPN before I logged off of IBAHN.

I've never had this issue either. I've had to re-authenticate every day through the web interface, but that's it.

Is this because you're using a company-provided laptop that has to be on VPN to connect to any website? In other words, you can't even get to the IBahn login page? If so, that's more of a company policy issue than a Marriott one...

No, that's not the case. This laptop has worked at every hotel I have stayed at in the world except with this IBAHN in the US. It worked with IBAHN in Germany.

It also works on my home network.

I have only had the problem at marriott properties with Ibahn in SLC, PIT, and Chicago.

I have to call and give them my MAC address and it works fine.

Tim

In the past I have had some issues with my MAC and IBAHN but they have all been hardwired (cat5) issues. Most of the time the 1-800 customer service number worked but there were a couple of times (most recent New Orleans Ren 6 months ago) when they were helpless/useless. I have never had an issue when going wireless using IBAHN (New Orleans Ren did not have wireless in the rooms). Good luck !!

(Personal Note) See iBahn!!! It's not just me (happens to me at a non-MI branded hotel in the SE - I dont even get the "I agree" blah blah blah page, I MUST call customer service to have them activate my MAC address)

(Professional Note) the business model for both In Room Entertainment and Internet have changed dramatically over the past 3-4 years with many companies being put into a difficult capital situation and creating an opportunity for new players to enter the market...in the coming few years you'll see these two items become more and more merged and the offerings more and more hi-tech and tailored to each guests specific prefs

Huh, I have a similar problem, except mine will often work in some places but not others. For example, in San Diego, it works in my room fine, but not in the lobby. For me, when it breaks, I don't even get a web page. It just doesn't get any access at all to anything.

Never knew about the VPN thing. I'll try that and see if it helps.

I'm not real technical but I subscribe to a VPN service for when I travel. Gives me a feeling of security and enables me to download US TV from Europe. Once I log into IBAHN, I then log into my VPN. I found that if I logged out of IBAHN prior to logging out of my VPN, I couldn't log back into IBAHN without calling support. As long as I log out of my VPN prior to logging out of IBAHN, I'm fine. Not sure how corporate VPNs work. I assume they automatically log into the VPN when you go online but I don't know.

Excellent tip, checked in tonight, had a problem with getting IBahn to work. Killed the vpn client, started over, and everything worked fine.

Thanks!