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Trouble with a small Home Network

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by atroxodisse

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I have a small home network of two computers. I recently purchased a second IP address from my @home ISP. Unfortunately, the second IP is on a different gateway and the two computers won't talk to each other anymore. Its a cable connection. Theycan ping each other but I can't seem to map drives or see each other on the network. A tracert shows one hop to my gateway and then right back to my roommate's computer. I'm running win98SE, he's running Win2k. I want to know the best way to connect the computers. I was thinking of a VPN. DO VPNs work well under 98SE? I was thinking of upgrading to win2k anyway. Are there any other ways? I didn't try NetBEUI, might that work?

10 replies

by terrence l. gabriel

You need to back up a long way.

You say you got a different "gateway" on the new ip address you "bought," do you mean network address?

You cannot see the other computer because they are not directly connected. If pc 1 has address 192.168.16.1/30 and if pc 2 has address 192.168.16.5/30, they cannot communicate because they are on different segments meaning they are not directly connected.

I am curious why you feel you need so many IP addresses from your ISP. In order for the denizens of a LAN to see the internet, there only needs to be one IP address.

The OS of the individual workstations makes no difference, you could be running Mac, Linux, Windoze, Unix, or any other thing you can imagine.

One rather primitive solution might be to set one pc up to access the internet via the cable modem and connect directly from the other pc via nics. PC to PC is supported well in Windoze but is not very secure.

A better solution would be to get a Cable modem router. A number ofdifferent brands are made - the best thing to do is do a google search and look around at the results. Some cable modems are hubs combined with the router, some need a separate hub.

The bottom line is that you connect the two (or 254) workstations to a hub as an ethernet LAN. Then if the hub is separate you connect to the router and thence to the cable connection. If the hub is part of the router, just configure the exterior ip address that the isp gives you and you are set. Of course your internal address would be one of the reserved private addresses. You can then communicate freely between the pcs on the LAN and each can also get internet access.

What you describe in your question is totally unnecessary.

by atroxodisse

I mean quite literally that both computers are on different gateways. I checked the Gateways with 'ipconfig' and they are different IP addresses, therefor different computers(in most cases). Of course they have different IP Addresses as well. I need the IPs because I am a gamer and a lot of services won't work properly without your very own IP. An example is Blizzard's battle.net. I was previously using Win2k's internet sharing to connect all my computers. The problem with battle.net is that it initiates the conversation with your computer instead of vice versa. What happens is my gateway/server/Internet sharing computer has no idea what computer on my internal network is suppose to receive the packets. I set up maps on the gatewayto tell it where to route the packets but this means that only one computer can receive the packets(if I'm using Win2k internet sharing). So if my roommate and I both wanted to play, we both need an IP. I suppose I could have set up a Linux box but I'm not knowledgeable enough about Linux to set it up properly. I just installed NetBeui and it works fine now.

by itla2001

are you connecting both computer to a hub and the connecting the cable modem to the hub. I would think that the cable modem's ip address should be the gateway for both computers. but cable modems are different than dsl.

just curious

jon

by atroxodisse

I have the cable modem plugged into a hub. Then that hub is chained to another hub which both computers plug into. The hubs are both ordinary 10BaseT hubs. From my understanding Cable modems and ADSL modems aren't Routers, they're bridges. Whichmeans all they do is pass on the signal(well maybe not all, but in essence). I wouldn't think they have their own IP address. I think it depends on what internal network setup they have at their location that decides which gateway I use.

by chappy zeke

After fussing for about a month with NICs and a HUB I bought a Router. Now the fussing is gone.

One tip. As a router or the cable modem is sensitive to power brown-outs during this hot and humid Ohio environment, I have them both of UPS. Save thehassle of resetting!

by dquig386

Interesting that you had to go to Netbeui.. You should have been able to IP.. Just for a note, I have had big time problems with 98SE on a home network and finally went back to first edition. Another solution that works is WinGate which costs a lotless than a router. I run that.. wouldn't recommend it for a commercial operation but for simple home use works ok

by atroxodisse

Wingate and other proxy software isn't configurable enough. I need the flexibility and speed of having my own IP. I use to use wingate, that kind of software is great if you just want to surf the net and get email, but it slows down the transfer alot, and caused me a lot of problems with games.

by jordana

In order for your two computers to comunnicate AT THE SPEED OF THE HUB AND NICS, you need both IP's to be on the same subnet. Contact your provider and get both IP's on the same subnet. Otherwise, you are routing trafiic accross your cable modem, which is totally uneccesary.

Right now:

you -> hub -> cable modem -> your GW-> ISP -> Roomate's GW-> cbale modem -> hub -> Roomate's PC.

On same subnet:
you -> hub -> roomate's PC.

Guess which is likely faster?

Jordan

by admin

My first thoguht was that if you get this working do you really want everyone on your subnet looking at your box in "Network Neighborhood"?

Basically, to do what you want on @home, call them and tell them you want to be reassigned ip's, preferably consecutive. They probably leased out all the others in your block between the time you got your first and second one. A VPN won't work with all games anyway.

A second question is in regards to @homes server policy, which is NO SERVERS. PERIOD.
When you start a server for your friend to join you are violating your contract and I have heard they actively scan for this, although I don't have first hand knowledge since I use DSL, where you buy a block of 8 IP's for lik3 9.99 a month and get to use at least five of them on boxes depending on your setup. Still, I've been curious how cable gamers get around this, although I could probabl;y go to "PlanetCableGaming" or whatever and just look.

Anyway, bottom line is if I were you I'd calland get customer service to allocate 2 consecutive IP's for you.

by atroxodisse

I was running a web server, an FTP server and sharing my IP. They have scanned once in the 3 years that I have been using them. So I shut down the FTP and the web server. I'm not worried about them scanning.

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