Re: Router install problem

On 7 abr, 13:09, Lem <lem...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
<old portion of thread snipped>





Paul,

I've been toying with the idea of emigrating to Brazil. Maybe I should
just come down and start a computer repair business in São Paulo. Can I
get by without any Portuguese?

You mean you still haven't picked up enough Portuguese in the stuff I
been sending in this thread?


A router is an interface between two networks that otherwise couldn't
communicate directly. In your case, that's the Internet (the Wide Area
Network or WAN) and your local area network (LAN). Usually, the WAN
side of the router is configured to talk to the Internet via a cable or
DSL modem which is connected to the router's WAN/Internet port and the
LAN side of the router (the 4 LAN ports and the wifi radio) is
configured to talk to the local computers. The router provides Network
Address Translation (NAT) to translate addresses between those on the
Internet and those on your LAN.

In your setup, I couldn't understand how to get the router to talk to
your SpeedStream modem, so I've disregarded that portion of the router
(the NAT function is provided by Windows ICS). However, when you used
the DI-524 "Internet Connection Wizard" you were configuring the
WAN-facing side of the router. I don't know why the router should have
"stalled" for 30 minutes, but none of the settings you made in the
"Internet Connection Wizard" are relevant to the way I was trying to
setup your system. Put another way, all of those settings have to do
with the DI-524's WAN/Internet port, which should not be connected to
anything.

I don't have a DI-524, so I don't know what its "Wizard" screens look
like, but for now, you needn't worry about settings you made there for
the reasons explained above. I've downloaded the manual, and based on
that, here's all that you need to do:

After you login to the DI524 configuration screens, you should see a
screen with 5 tabs across the top (Home, Advanced, Tools, Status, Help)
and 5 buttons on the left (Wizard, Wireless, WAN, LAN, DHCP).

Configure the DHCP server (which you seem to have already done, but for
completness):
Click the DHCP button. On the Home tab, click the radio button for
"Disabled" and click "Apply."

Configure the LAN-facing IP of the DI-524 (this is what you wanted to
set to 192.168.0.5):
Click the LAN button. On the Home tab, set the IP address to
192.168.0.5 and the subnet mask to 255.255.255.0 (leave "Local Domain
Name" blank) and click the "Apply" button.

Note 1: If you don't click the "Apply" button on any of these screens,
any changes you make on the screen are discarded when you switch to
another screen.

Note 2: As soon as you click "Apply" after changing the IP address, you
probably will be disconnected. That's because you were talking to the
router at 192.168.0.1, and it's not at that address any more. Just
re-login to the router, this time using 192.168.0.5 in your browser.

Before you quit the DI-524 configuration screens, you can check that
settings indeed have been applied by clicking on the "Status" tab and
"Device Info" button. The parts of this page that you are interested in
are the LAN and Wireless sections. The info in the WAN section is not
relevant because your WAN port is not connected. Note that the "DHCP
Release" and "DHCP Renew" buttons in the WAN section refer to the DHCP
server *at your ISP* and NOT to the DHCP server that is internal to your
DI-524.

Once you are working with the cable between the laptop and the DI524,
here's what to do with the wifi:

Login to the router at 192.168.0.5

Click the Wireless button. On the Home tab, set the SSID to something
unique, but not your last name or address. You can leave the channel at
its default (6), or if you experience interference from nearby wifi
networks, try setting it to 11 or 1 (due to overlap, there really are
only 3 distinct channels, even though it looks like 11). Setup the
encryption.

The downloadable manual only shows WEP encryption, but I assume that
more recent versions of the DI-524 should be capable of better
encryption. In order from worst to best: none, WEP 64, WEP 128, WPA,
WPA2. In picking a level of encryption, you are limited by both the
router and the laptop. If your laptop is relatively new, and fully
up-to-date with Windows XP sp2 and subsequent Microsoft updates, you
should have at least WPA, if not WPA2. A WPA "passphrase" can be up to
63 characters long. Pick one that is at least 8 characters, not a
dictionary word, uses both letters and numbers, but is easy to remember.
Many experts recommend using at least a 20 to 25 character phrase, but
this may be overkill. There are also many WPA/WEP key generators on the
Internet; Google for "wpa key generator".

One other thing: you probably should change the password used to access
the DI-524. This is done from the "Tools" tab, "Admin" button.
Remember to click the "Apply" button, and write down the password
somewhere safe. You can also set the router's time from the "Tools" tab
"Time" button. Other than compulsiveness, the only reason to do this is
if you set up some of the router's features to limit Internet access at
specified times.

Thanks for your wonderfully detailed instructions which I bet you
thought were by now truly n00bie-proof.
Alas no. The saga continues.
However, I did get through most of it and, even though pressing the
Apply button gave a never-ending "saving and restarting" message, it
did at least allow me to continue.
When I checked the Status tab, the changes I had made to the DHCP
server (disabled) and Lan IP (192.168.0.5) seemed to have been saved.
It's possible that the reason it didn't stop "saving and restarting"
is that the connection to 192.168.0.1 was lost during the saving
process.
Anyway, I was able now to connect to 192.168.0.5 and make the SSID and
encryption changes.
After this I tried to change the name and password for connection to
DI524 and it just wouldn't accept the Admin/Blank name and password
that was needed for this change to be accepted.
So, I reset the DI524 and hooked it up again. Now, trying to conect to
192.168.0.1 (I presume it gets reset back to this) I get the following
message:

Firmware Upgrade
File Path

NOTICE !!
If you upload the binary file to the wrong TARGET, the router may not
work properly or even could not boot-up again.

where the space after File Path is to allow me to input the path of
which I have no idea.

After several re-attempts to reset the DI524 I kept getting this page
rather than the Username/Password box that always appeared before.

Looks like Murphys Law applies with equal if not increased vigor down
here too.
I'm going to try again tomorrow to reset the DI524 and take it from
there.

Paul

--
Lem -- MS-MVP - Networking

To the moon and back with 64 Kbits of RAM and 512 Kbits of ROM.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Guidance_Computer


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