Home wifi network help - time zone

**El Chupacabra** · 12-12-2019, 09:34 AM

My cell phone won't keep the correct time zone when I am at home. It only does this at home and only started doing it recently, after I installed a new modem and updated the firmware on the router.

Phone is an Android Moto G6. Settings are on for using network time and time zone. I am not located near any time zone border.

Cell provider is Google Fi, and I have very poor cell signal at home, so voice calls go through wifi at home.

Modem is a D Link DSL standalone that I picked up to replace a 15-yr old one that kept needing to be rebooted. Model is DSL-520B.

Router is a Buffalo Airstation WZR-600DHP.

No other tablets or phones seem affected by the time zone issue at home. Mrs C has the same phone but on a different cell provider, and has cell coverage at home.

Anyone have ideas? Does the modem or router or both set the time zone for wifi connected devices? I have the router setting turned on to use network time, and set the correct time zone there. (This was the default setting.)

**gregorys** · 12-12-2019, 12:04 PM

Usually smartphones use the cellular tower to set time, not NTP [Network Time Protocol] servers on the internet. Tablets and computers do the opposite - get time from a NTP server.

But the TZ is usually dynamically set on the phone, depending on where the phone thinks it is. When it connects to the cellular network, that's easy. When it's connecting to your home internet, that's harder.

If I were to take a wild guess, it's guessing your TZ based on DNS. And Buffalo is making your connection "appear" to come from a location in a different TZ - perhaps by doing something goofy with DNS - like going to Google or OpenDNS or something similar.

I could be totally wrong - it's just a direction that seems plausible.

**cmcrawfo** · 12-12-2019, 12:30 PM

probably easier just to change all the other clocks over to your new time zone and call it a day.

**stuckathuntermtn** · 12-12-2019, 12:40 PM

Routers do have a timezone setting. Dig through there, you'll find it.

**bodywhomper** · 12-12-2019, 12:41 PM

my android (sprint system) phone has always had problems with time zones. in maui, it never changed over from pacific time. in the lee vining area, it always switches over to mountain time. it's never been a problem for me in the reno area, though. very oddly, it was a few minutes off for about a month this fall. we also have a moto phone on sprint network that's never been problematic with showing the correct time.

**El Chupacabra** · 12-12-2019, 12:57 PM

Both my modem and router have settings to get time from the network. I left the router on (set to correct time zone) and turned the modem setting off. Perhaps they were conflicting.... Will try this today and see.

**gregorys** · 12-12-2019, 01:26 PM

Originally Posted by stuckathuntermtn

Routers do have a timezone setting. Dig through there, you'll find it.

They do, but generally don't provision the Time/TZ settings for DHCP clients to get NTP and TZ from the DHCP Server. So, even if the TZ and time were wrong on the router, clients [generally] shouldn't get the wrong data from the router.

One other option - there are a fair number of reports [found via Google] that mimic yours. I wasn't able to find any solution though. But there's evidently an "automatic TZ" checkbox on some moto's. You might uncheck that. If the time itself is right, but it's just the TZ that keeps jumping, turning off auto TZ would probably fix it. [My Samsung does not have a separate Auto-TZ option - just the combined time and TZ together. So YMMV.]

**El Chupacabra** · 12-12-2019, 02:28 PM

Originally Posted by gregorys

They do, but generally don't provision the Time/TZ settings for DHCP clients to get NTP and TZ from the DHCP Server. So, even if the TZ and time were wrong on the router, clients [generally] shouldn't get the wrong data from the router.

One other option - there are a fair number of reports [found via Google] that mimic yours. I wasn't able to find any solution though. But there's evidently an "automatic TZ" checkbox on some moto's. You might uncheck that. If the time itself is right, but it's just the TZ that keeps jumping, turning off auto TZ would probably fix it. [My Samsung does not have a separate Auto-TZ option - just the combined time and TZ together. So YMMV.]

My Moto G6 does have an automatic time zone checkbox, which was turned on. I'll try with it turned off. The time is accurate, just not the time zone.