temporary wifi for family history fireside

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nognielsen
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temporary wifi for family history fireside

#1

Post by nognielsen »

I'm a new STS and our ward is having a family history fireside this weekend and it's interactive where members can bring their laptops. We have a nice new stake center with network jacks all over the place. We also have the Cisco 800 series firewall and 2 additional wireless routers that the last STS setup in the attic above the foyers.

My question is, can't I just setup a wireless router in the cultural hall hooked to one of the many network jacks in there? Then broadcast wifi with no password for the hour long fireside? This way I don't have to give out the password to all the members that show up for the fireside. Plus I believe we'd eclipse the 52 addresses or whatever that the firewall/main wireless acces point will give out or I'd try to set it up as an WAP. I know I might still run short on bandwidth, (we have 6 down)

So I tried this tonight with a dlink router I had laying around. It was set to a 192.168.0.1 address, with dhcp on, Dynamic ip address, and 192.168.0.100-199 as address to dish out. 255.255.255.0 subnet. I just plugged from the wall to the WAN port of the router. I could get connected to the wifi ssid I created however I couldn't ever get an outside web page to resolve. Am I missing something basic here? Do I need to enter DNS settings? Thanks so much.
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Mikerowaved
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#2

Post by Mikerowaved »

Should work. You might try logging into the DLink and check the status to see if it picked up an IP address/mask/gateway from the Cisco router.
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jdlessley
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#3

Post by jdlessley »

nognielsen wrote:My question is, can't I just setup a wireless router in the cultural hall hooked to one of the many network jacks in there?
No, it is not that simple. You have two choices. The first is to set up the cultural hall wireless router as a WAP without router functions. The second is to set up a subnet.

I will address the subnet first because that appears to be what you would like to do to avoid the limitation of available IP addresses at the Cisco 881W.

A subnet will require you to contact the GSC to configure the 881W. Part of what the technicians will need to know is the subnet router's IP address. The cultural hall router will have the 881W's IP address set as the Default Gateway and its operating mode should be router and not gateway. Then the wireless part of the router should be set to a channel that does not overlap the 881W or either of the other two WAPs in the building.

Setting up the cultural hall router as a dumb WAP is easier and will not require the GSC to reconfigure the 881W. You will, however, have a limited number of IP addresses.
nognielsen wrote:So I tried this tonight with a dlink router I had laying around. It was set to a 192.168.0.1 address, with dhcp on, Dynamic ip address, and 192.168.0.100-199 as address to dish out. 255.255.255.0 subnet. I just plugged from the wall to the WAN port of the router. I could get connected to the wifi ssid I created however I couldn't ever get an outside web page to resolve. Am I missing something basic here?
There is no way for the 881W and the cultural hall router to communicate. Neither one knows the other's IP address. The cultural hall router needs to be set up as a subnet as I described above and the 881W needs to be configured with the IP address of the subnet router.
JD Lessley
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Mikerowaved
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#4

Post by Mikerowaved »

jdlessley wrote:No, it is not that simple. You have two choices. The first is to set up the cultural hall wireless router as a WAP without router functions. The second is to set up a subnet.

I will address the subnet first because that appears to be what you would like to do to avoid the limitation of available IP addresses at the Cisco 881W.

A subnet will require you to contact the GSC to configure the 881W...
JD, I think you're making it more complicated than it is. With the DLink router setup to receive a "Dynamic IP" address on its WAN port, it simply sits on the network like any other DHCP-enabled client, and after receiving a valid IP address, mask, gateway address, etc., can do its own NAT and create a subnet without any other intervention from the Cisco firewall.
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harddrive
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#5

Post by harddrive »

nognielsen wrote:I'm a new STS and our ward is having a family history fireside this weekend and it's interactive where members can bring their laptops. We have a nice new stake center with network jacks all over the place. We also have the Cisco 800 series firewall and 2 additional wireless routers that the last STS setup in the attic above the foyers.

My question is, can't I just setup a wireless router in the cultural hall hooked to one of the many network jacks in there? Then broadcast wifi with no password for the hour long fireside? This way I don't have to give out the password to all the members that show up for the fireside. Plus I believe we'd eclipse the 52 addresses or whatever that the firewall/main wireless acces point will give out or I'd try to set it up as an WAP. I know I might still run short on bandwidth, (we have 6 down)

So I tried this tonight with a dlink router I had laying around. It was set to a 192.168.0.1 address, with dhcp on, Dynamic ip address, and 192.168.0.100-199 as address to dish out. 255.255.255.0 subnet. I just plugged from the wall to the WAN port of the router. I could get connected to the wifi ssid I created however I couldn't ever get an outside web page to resolve. Am I missing something basic here? Do I need to enter DNS settings? Thanks so much.
Nognielsen, it sounds like you did everything correctly on the dlink. Now the issue becomes that there is no routing protocol between the dlink and the 800. So it doesn't know how to route the packets. There are two options that I see.

1. Depending on how the 800 series router is connected to the WAN, you could take the cultural halls connection an plug it into the Modem for the Internet service and let it give out the ip address and make the DLink just a WAP.
2. If the dlink router has an uplink port or will access an ethernet cable from an external source then it should do NATTING, which is network address translation. This is needed so that it can route the packets appropriately.

hope this helps
nognielsen
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#6

Post by nognielsen »

So on a side note... I just checked my firewall... the subnet is 255.255.255.192. It appears from other threads I can possibly contact GSC to change that? That subnet will give me 60 or so addresses...;?Also from reading other threads about the previous ASAs and Pixs, the next 5 addresses after the firewall address are reserved/static. Is this true on the Cisco 881W as well? I'll go check it out again tonight and see if I can get the router talking with the firewall. The other 2 routers in the attic are not setup as WAPs so somehow the last STS got them working just fine. however I don't know how to log into those routers yet to check the config, might have to reset them :(
russellhltn
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#7

Post by russellhltn »

Mikerowaved wrote:JD, I think you're making it more complicated than it is. With the DLink router setup to receive a "Dynamic IP" address on its WAN port, it simply sits on the network like any other DHCP-enabled client, and after receiving a valid IP address, mask, gateway address, etc., can do its own NAT and create a subnet without any other intervention from the Cisco firewall.

That's how I'd expect it to work. However, the DLink might have a manual DNS entered rather then taking what the DHCP hands out.

However, the revelation that there's other routers in the building makes things interesting. Perhaps that wall jack is on one of those routers, so the DLink might be getting confused.
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rbeede
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#8

Post by rbeede »

You are the STS, but you still need authorization to add network equipment via the stake president. If he said make it work than that is good enough and this is temporary.

I'm guessing you expect 50+ people and don't want to give out the (currently unchangable) church wifi password.

Try just resetting the d-link to factory defaults. Plug the WAN port (it has multiple ports I assume like a normal home router) on the dlink into the wall ethernet socket. Connect a wireless client to the dlink and try it.

What model number is the d-link?

I've chained three home wireless routers together before without any issues. The NAT will work.

Once you have everything wired on a client laptop (connected via wifi) try running the following command from a command prompt (cmd):

ping 8.8.8.8

If you get a response then the Internet connection is working. Try DNS next with a command like:

ping http://www.lds.org

You should get a response too.
jdlessley
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#9

Post by jdlessley »

Mikerowaved wrote:JD, I think you're making it more complicated than it is. With the DLink router setup to receive a "Dynamic IP" address on its WAN port, it simply sits on the network like any other DHCP-enabled client, and after receiving a valid IP address, mask, gateway address, etc., can do its own NAT and create a subnet without any other intervention from the Cisco firewall.
You're right. When merely using the cultural hall router for Internet gateway operations it can be set up as a DHCP client. The operating mode should reflect that it is not the Internet gateway router but rather just another router on the net. The default configuration for most commodity routers is as a gateway. Change the Dlink's operating mode to router instead of gateway and it should then have access to the Internet.
JD Lessley
Have you tried finding your answer on the ChurchofJesusChrist.org Help Center or Tech Wiki?
nognielsen
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#10

Post by nognielsen »

Thanks ya'll got it working... I could never get the D-link router to work however. I had another linksys wrt54g laying around with dd-wrt firmware on it... Plug and play baby. Worked perfectly on connection of the cables... So who knows what the dlink's problem was. I had reset that thing, configured, and troubleshot till I was blue in the face. Oh well! I'm good to go.
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