Common Routing Issue Solution

[TehUser]

I know several people, including myself, who have a network setup that looks like:

Cable/DSL Modem -> Ethernet Router (.1.1) -> Wireless Router (.2.1)

I have had many occasions to want to access systems on the wireless router from ones on the ethernet router only to find that it wouldn't work.  Well, here are some steps to "flatten" your network to just one subnet.

Open the management interface for your wireless router.
Turn off DHCP.
Apply settings.
Set the LAN IP address of the wireless router to be on the same subnet as the ethernet router (.1.x).  Example: 192.168.1.10
Set the WAN IP address of the wireless router to be acquired automatically via DHCP.
Apply settings.
Plug a standard ethernet cable from a LAN port on the ethernet router into the Uplink (Not WAN) port of your wireless router.

Doing this will put all of your computers on the same subnet, and they will all be able to access one another.

[Newby]

I swear I was having the exact same problem.

Thanks.

[iago]

Haha, that sounds like a kludge to me

[dxoigmn]

Should be a way for your wireless router to act like a bridge, at least ny Apple Airport Express can.

[tA-Kane]

Not all things are as good as Apple stuff.

I have some of the major home brands: D-Link, Linksys, and Netgear. I find D-Link to be fairly troublesome when trying to access other resources within the LAN using a WAN address (eg, point my.domain.com to the WAN IP address and then try to access my.domain.com from within the LAN).

The Linksys seems to have trouble with the physical link; it seems to reconnect every so often resulting in Windows resetting all of your connections as well.

Netgear seems like it has the least problems, but it also seems the least feature rich. But hey, that could be good... all you really need is to be able to set DHCP on or off, set a DMZ host, punch holes through NAT, and etc, and it should be good.


I want to get a Cisco router and compare.

[quasi-modo]

I am pretty satisfied w/ my d-link. But then again here is my network

modem -> router (4 physical ports, one wireless) -> pcs.

Nothing that needs to be flattened. I can access every computer on the network... I can actually control every computer on the network via remote and tightvnc.

[Stealth]

I had a Netgear MR814v2 router until yesterday -- great routers for basic home use -- when a brand new AT&T-branded Wireless-G router was dropped off by CompUSA. It seems to be working fine and has more features than the Netgear - plus it looks a hell of a lot cooler.