RT-AC87 access samba share without aicloud

[axr0284]

Hi,
I was wondering how to access my samba shares on my external hard drive connected to the RT-AC87 router without using aicloud from outside my LAN.

For example, I want to just mount the shares as network drives in windows OR use a program such as andsmb to mount them in android.

For some reason both windows and the andsmb refuse to connect to my wan ip or the asus dns name.

Is that even possible?
Thanks,
Amish

 

[RMerlin]

Hi,
I was wondering how to access my samba shares on my external hard drive connected to the RT-AC87 router without using aicloud from outside my LAN.

For example, I want to just mount the shares as network drives in windows OR use a program such as andsmb to mount them in android.

For some reason both windows and the andsmb refuse to connect to my wan ip or the asus dns name.

Is that even possible?
Thanks,
Amish

SMB is not exposed over WAN, as it would be a huge security risk. You will need a VPN tunnel if you want to remotely access your LAN, or use FTP.

 

[watusi]

You use a VPN from your notebook to your router, and then your internal resources are available on your notebook. Your notebook will actually be on your home network while the VPN is connected.

Your shares should then just work as usual.

 

[axr0284]

Hi Thanks for your reply.
I followed your advice and tried the vpn way but it still won't work
I am actually using an android phone to try to connect to my shared drive.
I turned on the pptp based vpn on the router and connected my phone successfully to the router vpn but the samba client I use andsmb cannot locate the samba share on 3G.

If I turn on the wifi and connect directly to my lan, the andsmb app immediately connects to the samba share.

I am at a loss why.

I have attached pics of my vpn option. Maybe something is not set right.

 

[watusi]

Is 192.168.10 your local subnet?

I am not sure if SMB crosses sub-nets. I just allocate a small part of my local subnet for VPN.

I would not use PPTP, though. It's not considered very secure.

My preference is IPSec, but it won't cross some firewalls, and I don't think it's easily or properly supported on Merlin, at least for ARM-based routers. We have a years-old repository in optware, so if you want recent code with vulnerability fixes, you'll have to build and install a whole bunch of packages, in addition to figuring out how to manually configure it.

So, for now, I am using OpenVPN. I think it is safer than PPTP, it gets through firewalls more easily, and the client is persistent as heck, it does not drop every time your phone locks (iPhone) like IpSec.

(On my old router, I installed StrongSwan on OpenWRT.)

 

[watusi]

I see that I have not yet dealt with the subnet issue with my setup. Not sure if it is possible. As well, I haven't yet tested SMB between my Macbook and Mac Mini, I'd have to go to a Starbucks or somebody else's house to test...

My home subnet is 10.0.1.0/24. I see the VPN is set to 10.8.0.0/24. I need the VPN in a subset of 10.0.1.0/24. (Most home networks will typically be 192.168.1.0)

Definitely a problem, at least, for iOS device sync, etc. They have to be on the same subnet. (Say, you have a Mac set-up for WiFi sync.)

 

[axr0284]

Thanks for the help, once I changed my subnet to 192.168.1.x, the pptp vpn started working immediately using LAN ip address of the samba shares.