thomson router, with static ip laptops

franbe

hi, im sure this is an easy one but it has me confused, i upgraded to the upc 100 mb and got the new thomson router, i want to change over the router settings instead of all the other devices.

the old router was 192.168.1.8

i had a few laptops/ps3 etc all assigned with static ips at the each device, all within 192.168.1.(10 to 40) range.

so in the thomson configurater web page i switched the lan ip from 192168 zero1 to one1, and set up the security stuff.

i can get the first laptop online if i use 'obtain an ip address automatically' option in tcp/ipv4, but when i try to use static ip on the lappy im getting confused.

what do i put in for ip addys 'default gateway' and dns servers 'preferred dns server' ?
it used to be the same addy from the old linksys router, (but i think i had dhcp turned off in the old router).
dhcp is turned on in both lan page and wan page in the thomson presently.

is there a way of not having to change settings at every device around the house ?

vibe666

if you have static ip's set up then you need to (and should already) have static entries for your subnet mask, gateway and dns servers with the subnet mask set to 255.255.255.0 and the gateway and dns set to the thompson router's 192.168.1.1 address.

the only thing you should need to do is set the dhcp pool on the thompson to something which will exclude the static addresses you have assigned to your laptops so you don't end up with an IP conflict as the thompson would be able to give out one of your static addresses.

it's *possible* that the thompson may actively refuse a static address in a range that is already in its dhcp pool because of this, so just make sure your static ip's are not in the range of the pool and see how that goes.

so if you are using .10 to .40 for the static addresses you should be able to leave them at what they currently are and just start the dhcp pool on the router to use IP's from .50 to .100 in the same subnet and you should be sorted.

EDIT: i just checked on mine and it's under "Network" at the top, then the first option "LAN" on the left and under the "DHCP Server" setting called "Lease Pool Start" and "Lease Pool End" so set those to 192.168.1.50 and 192.168.1.100 respectively.

franbe

vibe666 wrote: »

EDIT: i just checked on mine and it's under "Network" at the top, then the first option "LAN" on the left and under the "DHCP Server" setting called "Lease Pool Start" and "Lease Pool End" so set those to 192.168.1.50 and 192.168.1.100 respectively.

cheers vibe, for some reason the thomson router doesn't allow me to change these settings
lan
"Lease Pool Start" 192.168.1.10
"Lease Pool End"192.168.1.254
what ever i change 10 and 254 to when i click apply they switch back to 10 and 254.

ive just tried changing the lappys ipv4 dns server values to 89.101.160.4 and 89.101.160.5, numbers i got from the thomson lan page and the first lappy worked with a static ip (192.168.1.16).

AFAIR i used to use the same value as the linksys gateway here. so the dns numbers in all the devices around the house if needed were a 192.168 number. is there any disadvantage to not masking the true dns from each device ? i guess the main advantage i s what im trying to do now which is not have change settings at every device.

i also tried fiddling around with the thomson wan statc ip dhcp options but didn't know what i was doing, and didn't get lucky, lol.

vibe666

not sure why it's not allowing you to change them, but if you change the static IP's of the devices in your house to use IP's from 192.168.1.2 to 192.168.1.9 (assuming 8 addresses is enough) that should do it for you, assuming you really need static addresses, otherwise you could just try leaving them with dhcp addresses assigned by the thompson and see how you go.

leave everything in the WAN settings alone though, that's the internet side of the router and you don't need to mess with anything there.

basically speaking, in a small home network your gateway, dns and dhcp are all managed by your router on the 192.168.1.1 address so any devices on your network should be pointed to that address for any of those services.

setting your devices to get an ip address via dhcp will automatically assign the correct subnet mask, dns and gateway addresses, but when you set a static ip on a device you need to fill these out as well.

the reason the options are there to put in different IP addresses for dns and gateway etc. is that in an office environment, all these services can (and usually will be) run from different servers so the settings need to be editable.

franbe

hi, yeah i have more than 8 statics, 11 in total. i think the main reason for the static ips was, for security, i had blocked nearly all ips not in use, like everything above 40, also port forwarding, and a ps3media server of the top of my head, and then because you cant name tag the ips in the router i had named them roughly to do with their location, like 10's on first floor, 20's upstairs, etc just so i could keep track of any problems that arose. but from what i read a conflict is rare so maybe ill get back to changing that number.

it was originally setup by a full online tutorial, and whatever way it was done, i could add new devices without having to think about it. as you said just point everything to the router.

the thing bugging me now is the first lappy wont connect unless i give it the real dns numbers (89.101.160.4 and 89.101.160.5), might sound dumb, but would updating the lappys wifi driver be the issue, its the oldest device in the house ? as i said i knew how to use it well but never really understood the nuts and bolts of it all.

franbe

franbe wrote: »

cheers vibe, for some reason the thomson router doesn't allow me to change these settings
lan
"Lease Pool Start" 192.168.1.10
"Lease Pool End"192.168.1.254
what ever i change 10 and 254 to when i click apply they switch back to 10 and 254..

so i got a workaround for this glitch/bug by setting the routers ip back to the original 192.168.zero.1 (from one.1)
now any change in lease pool start (and end) sticks when i click apply.
weird.
so i set the start to 40 and can keep my upstairs/downstairs/etc ip assignment.
and then switched the router back to 192.168.one.1 now the lease pool is stuck at -> starts at 40 and ends at 254 (any edits are undone when i click apply)
very strange

franbe

but i still cant get the first lappy (updated wifi driver) connected unless i explicitly input on the lappy the 2 upc dns numbers (89.101.160.4 and 89.101.160.5)

is this normal ? id like the option in the future of changing the dns at the router without having to fire up and edit 11 other devices

vibe666

franbe wrote: »

but i still cant get the first lappy (updated wifi driver) connected unless i explicitly input on the lappy the 2 upc dns numbers (89.101.160.4 and 89.101.160.5)

is this normal ? id like the option in the future of changing the dns at the router without having to fire up and edit 11 other devices

that's not normal, no. once you have DHCP set up on the laptop it *should* be getting it's DNS settings from the router and also making DNS requests to it as well.

try setting the IP to use DHCP (i.e. automatic) on the laptop, but then manually set the primary DNS to use 192.168.1.1 and see if that works. that way, even if you change the DNS settings on the router, since the laptop is manually requesting DNS lookups from the router, it should still work.

franbe

ok ill try that later and let you know how it worked.

..but if i do use that setup i will lose the permanent static ip for each device, the lappy would be .9, one day .22 the next, etc.

cheers

vibe666

to be honest, in a home network it's not usually an issue as you will never fully utilise the available DHCP pool and if you have a IP address leased it'll keep that IP until the lease expires and then just renew the lease on the same IP.

if you're running anything on your network that absolutely has to keep the same IP due to port forwarding rules on the router or something like that then by all means keep the IP static, but for regular laptops and pc's and stuff like that it's not really necessary most of the time. even for fileshares and stuff like that, you can still access it by hostname instead of IP.