- Opened the Box that was delivered through UPS
- Ripped off the plastic wrapping of the Linksys Box
- Opened it and took out everything and laid it on my bed
- Turned off all my PC's
- Unplugged my Cable Modem, and unplugged
all my Ethernet cables and my switch - Put my switch aside and made space on my
dresser - Hooked up the Ethernet cable from the back
of my cable modem to the WAN port on the back of the Router - Plugged in all my PC's Ethernet cables to the
back of the Router (4 of em) - Plugged my Cable Modem back in for Power
- waited 5 seconds for it to sync
- Plugged the Routers Power Cable In
- Red Diagnostic light came on for about 5 seconds
then turned off and it was all ready to go! - I booted up my main PC
- Went to network settings and TCP/IP and changed
my computer name to something different, and made sure that obtain IP automatically was chosen, and that DNS was Disable - Rebooted PC
- Went into Internet Explorer and type 192.168.1.1 to gain access
to the setup menus of the Router - Entered all the appropriate information in and clicked
apply - Rebooted Machine
- Everything worked!
Total Setup Time: Less then 5 minutes! I then booted up my other PC's and made sure the settings were correct in TCP/IP and rebooted them and every one of them was able to surf the web and download and upload just fine! I've had a couple of very annoying problems with ICQ, Napster and Serv-U FTP
In ICQ people cannot send me files, it says "Can't establish direct connection" However I can send files to people just fine. Also I cannot connect to my own Active List Server. In Napster I cannot download any MP3's at all To set my PC up so it can be an FTP Server I had to forward a Port to the IP of that machine so that it would work. But in testing some people couldn't connect to my FTP even with the correct port forwarded, so I had to put that PC in the DMZ and then all worked well.
Also I had to put in the actual server address for Mail and News on the @home's servers. Refer to the Detailed setup Page and at the bottom "Extra Special Setup for @home users" for more info on this. *note - I have AT&T@Home Service and my IP is static | - Unpacked it
- Threw the stupid "setup wizard" disk in the trash (setup wizards are for momma's boys (j/k)).
- Plugged in the power connections and Ethernet Cabling
- Plugged in the WAN Ethernet connection from my DSL Modem
- Turned the DSL modem off
- Turned the Router on
- Pressed the reset button on the Router
- Every PC on my LAN was already setup to be a DHCP client. So, all I had to do was reboot all of my systems (at this point) to get DHCP IP's from the Router
- All of my systems came up with a DHCP IP from the Router - everything was working as expected
- Entered the Router's LAN IP address into the web browser on my personal system
- Clicked on the settings tab and entered a name for the Router and my DSL domain name (swbell.net)
- Selected "Find IP Automatically"
- Placed 'zeros' in the: DNS field, Gateway field, and the SUBNET mask field. (I receive these automatically)
- Clicked on "Apply"
- Turned the DSL modem back on.
- Got really confused when it started working immediately.
Total Setup Time: ~5 minutes! At this point I checked: Web browsing, Mail, and played some UT, and Q3 on-line. Everything worked perfectly! I had a big smile on my face. I really never expected it to be so easy. Now ICQ didn't work as normal. I had some problems using it and had to start choosing "send through server" to get some messages out. Also, sending files through ICQ, has become a problem in some cases, unless I 'make' the computer I'm using ICQ on a DMZ host. If you do this you also need to put up a Firewall on that system - because this makes the DMZ host computer visible to the fun-loving Internet Hacking community. I am still having problems running a Quake3 or UT Server through the Router. I'm also having problems using Napster. Monty (over at the SpeedGuide discussion forums) has been able to run UT and Half-Life servers with some success. I have not been able to locate anyone who has successfully set up a Quake3 server from behind the Router. It's hard for me to test though - as I only have one CD key. (Hey Activision - how's about a 'review' sample for good 'ol Vorpal? :) Sidenote: Part of my problem in running a game server is that I have a dynamic IP. This has never been a problem before, but, this Router gives you no control over renewing (or releasing) you IP. Thus, I loose my IP address sometimes now. DSL Notes: The only thing "different" about setting the Router up for my DSL service was that I had to manually 'blank' out the setup fields for: SubNet Mask, Default Gateway, and DNS Server. I had to do this by highlighting each filed and entering a zero in each one. I also had to select "Obtain IP address automatically". If any of these thing are not done - it just won't work. This may be a little bit confusing to some (having to type in zeros and such). *note - I have Southwestern Bell DSL service and my IP address is dynamic. |