Pace 5268AC Gateway Restarts Itself Repeatedly

Problem & Details

My router repeatedly resets itself intermittently for unknown reasons.

-It can happen at any time of day

-It happens more frequently between 12 am and 4 am.

-It seems to happen more than usual specifically when playing Call of Duty, and hardly ever happens when watching Hulu or Netflix. The nights that I can’t play COD BO2 because of this problem I usually go watch Netflix or Hulu and it doesn’t reset, but it HAS happened rarely while streaming as well. I was not able to play from about 12 am to 4 am without it constantly resetting (2-5 times per hour) but was finally able to play between 4 and at 6:30 am without it resetting.  

I first had a Motorola NVG589 router which worked fine for a year, then I started having the problem where it would just reset itself especially when I wanted to play BO2. Then it was replaced at the first service call after I reported the router resetting. It was replaced with the Pace 5268AC and it reset itself once after I first got it, then worked for a week or two, then started the problem again and quickly escalated to not being able to play at night.

Quite a few threads exist on this and other forums about this issue where a router (any brand) will repeatedly restart for unknown reasons, but it seems to be mostly AT&T customers. Some said that turning off IPv6 in the router worked for them, but it did not work for me. Others said replacing the router worked for them, it must have been a bad router in that case, and I suppose it’s possible that I have a bad router but not as likely since it was already replaced. Both routers would have had to been bad and have the SAME problem, which doesn’t seem likely. The only other cases I found that were solved involved where the router kept trying to update but couldn’t and so would get stuck in a loop. Upgrading or downgrading firmware or swapping out the router helped in that case. There is one post where the person said the following:

“He [the technician] upgraded the filters in the termination box on the side of the house, and looked at the line noise. He thought one of the pairs looked out of whack, and went back to the local node to switch pairs. Two hours later, I was back online and the modem hasn't rebooted since.”

Is that something I should ask a technician to check?

Hardware & Network Info

Old Router: Motorola NVG589

New Current Router: Pace 5268AC

Firmware:

I have 4 active Ethernet connections (3 PCs Windows 7 and 1 PS3) and a few phones and one printer connected via wireless. All (except the printer) have Norton Security on them.

The router is plugged directly into the same outlet it always had been connected to even when it was working. No extension cord or surge protector.

Things that have been tried to resolve the issue:

With the first router, AT&T phone Support “updated software and restarted the router”, didn’t work. When the technician came, they tested the line and didn't see any issues, so they just replaced the router.

With the second router, the tech grounded the outside box, saying that it not being grounded could cause voltage issues. Then he reset the router to factory defaults. I still had the problem after that even though I didn’t change any settings except I disabled Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) for security reasons, so it's not that I've accidentally changed a setting and made this happen. The router was plugged directly into the wall into the same outlet it always had been for the last two years. In case something had become wrong with the outlet, I tried another outlet and still had the problem and also tried plugging it into a surge protector and still had the problem. I also shut off all computers in the house in case there was a Trojan or something messing with my network and still had the problem.

I’m at my wit’s end now. I pay $90 a month for fiber optic internet only and I can’t rely on it. It’s basically unusable during the peak hours that I want to use it. I asked the technician about looking at the logs from the router itself since there might be a clue to show why it restarting, and also asked if he would look at the inside box, which had come off the wall and had wires hanging out, but he did neither of those things.

Does anyone have an idea what could be causing this or at least how to begin troubleshooting it from this point forward? I’ve tried looking at the logs but I’m not sure what to look for. If a hacker got my IP address from playing COD and is attacking my router, wouldn’t refreshing the external IP address fix that problem? Any help is appreciated!