Networking & connection-sharing queries

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TheVoice

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Hi everyone,

First post here, but I've been looking through this board for a week or two now, and it's definitely a useful resource for anyone considering getting MyWireless.

While we haven't applied for MyWireless yet, ODS are coming out on Wednesday with some external antennas to see if we can get a better signal, 'cause yesterday he was getting only 1 bar outside the house, and nothing inside (we're in Riverclub, Sandton, JHB).

Anyway, providing all goes well on Wednesday, we're going to need to set-up a mini-network so that both my PC and my parents' PC can use the connection. We (or rather I) decided that connecting the MW modem directly to one of our PCs (most likely my parents' one, because of the external antenna) would be hassle because if that PC is switched off or restarted, I'll lose my connection.
It would be fine for them because they'll just be doing occassional surfing, but I don't particularly want to see my planned 250MB mod download for Ghost Recon go down the pan just because Mum wants to save electricity. It's not like <i>they</i> even pay the bill anyway...

So, I'm planning to use an old PC we have (running Win98, not sure if it's SE or not) to act as a proxy for the internet, as well as a back-up storage server and firewall. Question is, which of these set-ups would be most practical?

1. Put 2 NICs in the old 98 PC, connect my PC to one NIC, my parents' one to the other NIC, and run the MyWireless modem through USB on the old PC.

2. Buy a switch, connect all 3 PCs to that, and then run the MW modem through USB on the old PC.


I also probably have the option to use a router (though I'm not so familiar with the operation of those), but I'd assume it just involves connecting the MW modem to the router, then my PC and my parents' PC to it also. But from what I've seen, routers are quite expensive, so I'd prefer to use one of the other two.

Are there any advantages and disadvantages to either of those set-ups? From what I can see, 1 would be cheaper and somewhat easier since it involves using less cable and 2 NICs instead of a switch. That said, I've heard many horror stories about trying to get 2 NICs working in one PC.

Of course, all this could become moot if it's determine that the signal here in glorious Sandton is practically non-existent - funny that, I'd have thought we'd be one of the places that would have a good signal anywhere. But maybe all this info will be useful to other people, even if it isn't for me.

Thanks for any help!


Chris
 
Hello,

Your best option would be to use a product like smoothwall (www.smoothwall.org). Believe me, it's extremely easy.

You need: ethernet cable for mywireless modem, a hub/switch, 2 nic's in the old PC, and nics and cables for all computers you want to connect.

Search this forum for "Smoothwall HOWTO" for information about how to set up the smoothwall.

Basically, you install 2 nic's into the old PC, connect one to the mywireless modem, and one to the hub. Then connect all other computers to the hub, and set them up so that they use the old pc as a gateway.

It took me about 5 hours to install our network of two pcs plus the firewall, including crimping etc. And I have never EVER even touched networking like that before. It just worked first time!

Good luck.
 
Hi,

Thanks for the help. Out of curiousity, how would that set-up be more beneficial to me, than using the MW modem through USB on the old PC, and connecting my own and my parent's PCs to each of the two NICs?Reason I ask is, even though switches aren't that expensive, it's still a cost that I'd rather avoid!

Thanks again.
 
TheVoice

The reason that the setup that johnny-c recommends is "better", is the setup with the switch allows you to add other PC's at a later stage with very little hassle, whereas the setup with 2 NIC's(connected to each of the other PC's) is more complicated, and is very limited in regard to adding new PC's.

Also, USB is extremely flakey at times, using the Ethernet cable option (another R250) is more reliable.

Where in Riverclub are you? I am on the side where the roads are all named after trees (eg Oak, Elm etc)

Will you let me know whether you get a signal?

Regards
Choc
 
TheVoice mentions he wants a backup server as well as firewall.

Smoothwall can do this, but not without a lot of modification that involves really getting your hands dirty - for instance, there's no compiler and trying to get binaries to run involves a lot of knowledge of dependencies etc., not to mention configuring samba.

Loath that I am to say it, for now, use win98 as your firewall - just do a lot of research for the best option you can find.

After that, look at replacing it with a Linux distribution, or finding a really old spare box that you can load something like smoothwall onto.
 
Adding new PCs isn't really too much of a worry - there's only my PC and my parent's one that need access to the internet, and I don't think it's likely that we'll be adding more.

I was thinking about installing something like ZoneAlarm on the Win98 PC to act as our firewall. I can't really see that I need massive amounts of security though, which is why I don't particularly want to go all-out on setting it all up!

rsachoc: Is that setup really worth the R500+ it'll cost to set it up? I don't have a switch already (or the ethernet cable for the MW modem), so that's another cost that I'm going to have to convince my parents to agree to. Wouldn't normally be a problem, but if we have to get an external antenna also, then it's making the start-up costs quite expensive.

Oh, and I'm in Kingswood Crescent, off Panners Lane. Got a slight signal outside our house, but we're having some external antennas tested tonight to see if we can get a good enough signal to actually use, before we commit to anything.

Thanks for all the help.
 
Well, I say go for the Win98 box with two NIC's for the moment, then maybe at a later stage you could splash out on the switch and ethernet cable. What I would suggest (if you have a contact) is to grab a wireless router, one with a built-in switch, wireless and router. Then plug your MW modem into the WAN port, and all is set, you have a "firewall", you dont need a seperate PC (power-saving)

You would need some sort if Internet Connection sharing on the Win98 box, if it is SE, then you have some already. If not, check out the forums for others. Install Zonealarm on you and your Mom's PC, not the 98 box.

I'm sure when the Sandton City tower goes live, you will definately get a signal from there? At the moment, I think Hyde Park is the closest? I am unfortunately in the dip, the other side of Riverclub, so even when the Sandton tower goes up, I may or may not get a signal

If you like, and it all goes ahead, I can help you with the setup?

Choc
 
Well...Dean from ODS kindly came out earlier with a booster antenna and it seems to work...outside that is, which means that we'll probably have to get an external antenna, and the prices of those ain't too pretty. Only other option we have is to wait and see when the Sandton tower gets plugged in, but it seems nobody knows that, unfortunately. Could be a few weeks, could be months I suppose.

But well, I guess it's better than hearing that we're totally screwed and that we can't get a signal at all, so all is not lost. Not yet anyway!

rsachoc: Thanks again for your help. Why should I install the firewall on my and my parents' PCs, and not on the old one? I was under the impression that if it was installed only on the old machine, it would cover any computers connected to it.
I've already got a firewall anyway (PC-cillin 2002, came free with my motherboard), so I'm OK either way.

Just remembered the box is 98SE, since I had to reinstall it a few weeks back and SE is all I've got. No display drivers though...so I hope the MW set-up isn't fussy about it being 640x480 with 16 colours!

We were getting a signal from the Randburg tower, apparently, but I'm hoping that when Sentech get the Sandton tower running, we'll have that one giving us some better coverage.

Thanks again.
 
Now i'm no genius when it comes to networking... but maybe a quick and cheap way to do this...

If I read and remember correctly, once you have the modem set up and working you don't need the usb connection...

so why don't you just get yourself a normal LAN hub, they're like R300 if that...

and then plug both computers and the MW Modem into the hub and you're done...


.:Theta:.
------------------------------
AMD AthlonXP 2200+
MSI K7N2G-ILSR nForce 2
MSI Ge-Force 4 Ti 4200
2x 256Mb DDR 333Mhz
WD 120Gb Caviar SE

Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us.
 
Doesn't work like that I'm afraid - the hub doesn't know how to communicate with the modem, and the modem doesn't know how to communicate with the hub. A router would work (same idea, but it supports that sort of thing) but they're a lot more expensive, which is what we're trying to avoid, especially if we're gonna have to get an external antenna now.

Thanks for the input though. :)
 
TheVoice

The free firewalls you get are personal firewalls (ZoneAlarm etc) are for the actual machine you want protected. You need the Pro version ($$$) to protect PC's that are not the local PC (hope that makes sense)

I would look into getting some sort of NAT "firewall" to share the connection (Winroute is one I have used sucessfully)

Other than that, go with a wireless router (about R900) which has a built-in switch, and voila! you're done
 
I would definitely say option 2, buy a small switch or hub. Putting two NICs in one PC, you have two physical subnets and thus two different TCP/IP subnets and you have to set up routing between the two (that is if I am not mistaken, i.e. unless Win98 can do something I don't know about). With a hub you have other advantages, e.g. you can easily expand the network if need be (e.g. if a friend comes over and you want to plug into the network).

The firewall should be installed on whichever machine will have the real IP address, which will be whichever one is on all the time for the connection.

Assuming the USB on the PC is reliable, I don't think it will make too much difference whether you use the LAN cable or USB cable, except that a LAN cable is probably easier to extend to get more distance between the PC and the modem if you need to place the modem in some weird spot.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">The free firewalls you get are personal firewalls (ZoneAlarm etc) are for the actual machine you want protected. You need the Pro version ($$$) to protect PC's that are not the local PC (hope that makes sense)<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
You have to use NAT anyway because you only have one real IP address from Sentech, thus this point is moot, because (unless you have a fancy router on which you manually set up some sort of port forwarding if you're running servers behind the NAT machine), all machines behind the NAT machine will have private IP addresses and cannot be directly accessed from the outside world. Thus you only need to protect the machine that actually connects to the Internet.
 
I'm sorry, but installing Zonealarm on the NAT machine will not protect the other machines, only the machine running the NAT software itself.

A NAT device of some sort (software or hardware) provides protection to the machines on the inside of the network (ie the one with private IP's). NAT in itself is a form of firewall, because it does port blocking, only accepts repsonses from the internet if they come from a machine on the internal network.

You best bet would be to run Winroute on the Win98 machine, connected to a switch, and run Zonealarm on the other machines if you are paranoid. Otherwise, run Winroute (or an alternative) on the Win98 machine with the two network card setup as described above.

Choc
 
...OK...looks like setting up this network is going to be a <i>little</i> more work than I thought it would be!

No major rush though, still waiting for Dean to get back to us with info/prices on external antennas (hint hint!). :)
 
ah yes of course...

noted...

about how much are we talking for a basic router?

.:Theta:.
------------------------------
AMD AthlonXP 2200+
MSI K7N2G-ILSR nForce 2
MSI Ge-Force 4 Ti 4200
2x 256Mb DDR 333Mhz
WD 120Gb Caviar SE

Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us.
 
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