Answers below - thank you for your reply -
Jacques B. wrote:
Grrr.. I've cut off my pinky so I don't hit return this time,
> [Warning: second question attached :-) ]
>
> Thanks for all the help and advice - sorry, I could have described the
> situation better - the actual problem I'm trying to solve here has to do
> with trying to find a wireless router that I can use with my Linux
> server (with a static address).
>
> I used to have a Linksys WRT54GX4, which was great until it stopped
> working, and I had to spend hours on the phone with customer service
> reps dumber than me, and the RMA replacement arrived DOA. The Linksys
> had the ability to function as a switch (wrong word?) - that is, it
> would pass traffic straight through to two machines on my internal
> network, both of which had static, public IP addresses - one, the
> server, connected via CAT5, and the other, a Windows laptop, connected
> wirelessly.
If you had a static, PUBLIC IP address for each of your two systems,
then they were not on an INTERNAL network. They were on the
PUBLIC/EXTERNAL network (unless your ISP uses internal addresses for
all clients which I haven't seen before).
>
> Because of the customer-services & quality-control issues Linksys was
> having, I tried switching to a Zyxel X-550 wireless router.
> Unfortunately it does not seem to have the ability to cope properly with
> public IP addresses on my internal network.
See above, if you had public IP addresses, you did not have an
internal network. Your machines were connected directly to the
external network going through the switch (your Linksys was a
gateway/router/switch).
>
> So I thought that if it were an simple matter to configure my Linux
> server in the way I've described, it would make the (temporary) process
> of fiddling around with various bits of networking equipment easier.
>
> So, all that being said, do you have any technical recommendations?
> Hope I have adequately described the problem...
>
If you do not get an IP from your ISP, you cannot go ahead and assign
one yourself. Again this is based on how you explained your network,
that you were getting public IP addresses for both machines. Unless
your ISP has allocated a block of static IPs (which would apply to a
business setup, not a home setup) in which case you probably could
simply assign them the static IPs.
The other issue would be the subnet mask to use. If you are getting
public IPs, you need to know the subnet mask being used. Not to
mention the gateway IP.
I think we need to clarify your exact network setup before being to
help you here.
What IPs were you getting before (i.e. 192.168.x.x, 10.x.x.x, or some
other IP - there is a third internal IP range I just forget it and not
important - just need to know what you were getting). We don't need
the full IP, just the first 2 octets would suffice. That will tell us
if you were truly getting a public IP or not.
Who is your ISP? Others who have the same ISP can shed some light on
how it works with them if you are not certain.
Jacques B.
I have 4 addresses total, 66.92.blah.blah. My setup, until the Linksys
broke, was (from "outside" to "inside"):
ADSL modem
Linksys (connected to the DSL not via its "WAN" port, but via one of its
"LAN" ports)
Windows Laptop (66.92.blah.bleh) - Linux "server" (66.92.bleh.blah)
That's it - pretty simple setup - the only wrinkle was the bit about the
Linksys not running NAT or DHCP, but just passing the traffic through to
the "internal" devices.
Thank you - as a last-second thought, it occurs to me that I might be
able to connect the Server directly to the DSL modem, then connect the
Zyxel to that - it's not really important to me that the laptop have its
own address.
Peter
