Netgear DG834GT PPPoE Relay / Half Bridge

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calvincoetzee

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Hi guys,

Just purchased myself a Netgear router and well it hasn't got that little half bridge feature which I used so much on my previous Telkom 100WR

I was wondering if anybody knows how to put the router into half bridge mode or as Netgear would call it PPPoE Relay.

I am aware of the hidden menu to switch the router into modem only mode, however why buy a feature rich, firewall router and turn it into a modem :/

I have read that this works as a temporarily fix for the DG834G routers:
Telnet into the router and: brctl addif br0 nas0
http://mybroadband.co.za/vb/showthread.php?t=103960&page=2

Any help would be appreciated :)
 
Well there's another thing I have been looking at but... decided it might be a bit risky loading the DGTeam firmware compared to the outcome.
I must say a loopback would be nice as well as half bridge.
Have you tried the DGTeam firmware without hassles?

Netgear is so expensive and it's a pity that they don't have all the advance settings, I could have purchassed a Billion router but chose Netgear :/
 
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I see you've discussed this problem already, real pity that so many Netgear users need this feature and, well, Netgear can release it with a single firmware update.
Sigh, I guess they take it out on purpose to resell it in a higher cost router.
 
calvincoetzee said:
I have read that this works as a temporarily fix for the DG834G routers:
Telnet into the router and: brctl addif br0 nas0
Click to expand...
Awesome find! works like a dream. You have to do it each time the router is reset, but that's no problem for me.. how often does a router reset!? Put the thing on a UPS and you're sorted ;)
First you need to enable debug mode, which you can do by going to http://192.168.0.1/setup.cgi?todo=debug
once that's done, telnet into the router. you'll notice it runs linux.
execute brctl addif br0 nas0
and then you're sorted :)
 
I've just managed to work out an even easier way to set up half-bridging if the router is reset that i've formulated from a few other tricks people have found.
Instead of having to go through the whole process of enabling debug mode and telnetting in, here's an easier way that doesnt require any of that kind of technical knowledge.
All you need is this link:
http://192.168.0.1/setup.cgi?todo=ping_test&c4_IPAddr=&/usr/sbin/brctl+addif+br0+nas0

You should then see the following in your browser window:
browser said:
Usage: ping [OPTION]... host
Click to expand...
If so, the process completed successfuly =)

If you see the following, then your router is already bridging:
browser said:
Usage: ping [OPTION]... host device nas0 is already a member of a bridge; can't enslave it to bridge br0.
Click to expand...

If you see an error saying 'no such device nas0', then your router hasn't established its own PPPoE connection, which is required for this to work - get that working first.

Hope this method is found useful ! :)
I recommend you add this url to your bookmarks, making it easy to enable the mode on demand without any hassles.

Unfortunately this will only work while the modem's own PPPoE connection is established, and once that's dropped, or the router is restarted for whatever reason, this will have to be re-executed. I could code a little application that would run in the background and make this request at a given frequency of say 60 seconds, so that it would seem transparent and as long as your computer is on, this would will work automatically. Let's see if there's a demand for such an app =)
 
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^^^ Dude thanx a mill!!!!!

So this basically enables PPPOE relay like on other netgear routers ?
 
///MoH said:
So this basically enables PPPOE relay like on other netgear routers ?
Click to expand...
Yeah, the only downside being that you need to redo it when your modem is restarted (eg from power cuts), or the connection on the router is dropped - which would suck for people who have frequent losses in sync. A little app to do this automatically every few seconds would be quite useful.
If anyone knows how to modify the firmware image, all we'd need to completely automate this process is the inclusion of this brctl command in /etc/ppp/ip-up (/tmp/etc/ppp/ip-up). Unfortunately I dont know how to open the firmware .img file for editing, so I can't do that right now.
 
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^^^ Ahhh i see.

It works well on my Netgear DG834G v2! FINALLY! I don't have to use the mega105wr anymore :D:D:D. Thanks man.

Write the app :p
 
I've been fiddling around some more trying to make my own life easier, and I think i've managed to make something quite useful without having to tamper with the firmware or anything 'permanent' that a simple reboot can't fix.

Running the following will create and exec a little shell script on the device that will automatically try enable half-bridging every 10 seconds.

Baisically, now you'll only need to run this once each time you restart your DG834G(T) and then as long as the router's own PPPoE connection is live, it will ensure it's bridged too, every 10 seconds. This should make life a lot easier =)

Copy paste this into your browser's address bar. Again, you may wish to add this to your bookmarks or create a shortcut to make it easy to run each time your router's restarted.
192.168.0.1/setup.cgi?todo=ping_test&c4_IPAddr=%26/bin/echo+\%23\!/bin/sh+%3E+/tmp/b;/bin/echo+while+/usr/bin/[+1+]\;+do+%3E%3E+/tmp/b;/bin/echo+/usr/sbin/brctl+addif+br0+nas0+%3E%3E+/tmp/b;/bin/echo+/bin/sleep+10+%3E%3E+/tmp/b;/bin/echo+done+%3E%3E+/tmp/b;/bin/chmod+a%2Bx+/tmp/b;/bin/sh+/tmp/b

Note: Your browser will be waiting for the page to load indefinitely. Once you've run the link, give it a second or two and then close the page. The script will continue running in the background on the router.

Let me know how this works for you guys! =]
 
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Thanks so much, I gave up on the thread, came back today and there was the answer =D Thanks man, you're a life saver!
 
can we use routesentry (for vista) after enabling the tweak for PPPoE relay on the DG834G?
 
Message?

Usage: ping [OPTION]... host device nas0 is already a member of a bridge; can't enslave it to bridge br0. device nas0 is already a member of a bridge; can't enslave it to bridge br0. device nas0 is already a member of a bridge; can't enslave it to bridge br0. device nas0 is already a member of a bridge; can't enslave it to bridge br0.
Click to expand...
 
It's already been added...

Mine works, but it freezes the router after a few minutes of use :(

So it dials international automatically, then routesentry connects to local and sets the routes.
 
I don't own a Netgear router myself, but I think the following would do exactly the same as Fragtion's script, except it won't give the "host device nas0 is already a member of a bridge" error:
Code: 
192.168.0.1/setup.cgi?todo=ping_test&c4_IPAddr=%26%2Fbin%2Fecho+%5C%23%5C%21%2Fbin%2Fsh+%3E+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3B%2Fbin%2Fecho+PATH%3D%2Fusr%2Fsbin%3A%2Fbin%3A%24PATH+%3E%3E+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3Becho+while+%5B+1+%5D%5C%3B+do+%3E%3E+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3Becho+if+%5C%21+brctl+show+%5C%7C+grep+-q+nas0%5C%3B+then+%3E%3E+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3Becho+brctl+addif+br0+nas0+%3E%3E+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3Becho+fi+%3E%3E+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3Becho+sleep+10+%3E%3E+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3Becho+done+%3E%3E+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3Bchmod+a%2Bx+%2Ftmp%2Fb%3Bsh+%2Ftmp%2Fb
The unencoded URL version of my script is:
Code: 
&/bin/echo \#\!/bin/sh > /tmp/b;
/bin/echo PATH=/usr/sbin:/bin:$PATH >> /tmp/b;
echo while [ 1 ]\; do >> /tmp/b;
echo if \! brctl show \| grep -q nas0\; then >> /tmp/b;
echo brctl addif br0 nas0 >> /tmp/b;
echo fi >> /tmp/b;
echo sleep 10 >> /tmp/b;
echo done >> /tmp/b;
chmod a+x /tmp/b;
sh /tmp/b

If you want your Netgear 834G to do NAT loopback, see this webpage for the patch: http://www.waveform.plus.com/netgear.html
 
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