What do I need for SBC Static IPs

[SRITRI]

Firstly I would like to say that I am a novice in understanding network and IP setups.

I have SBC 5-static IP plan Business DSL connection. I had a 2Wire modem/router given by SBC to handle all the 5 sticky/static IPs. I need 4 stickies for my 4 webservers and one more for sharing the internet by other wireless clients.

The 2Wire modem/router had this option of being able to do multi-NAT (?) easily where I could choose the fixed IPs from router GUI.

So far all the DLink's, Linksys's & Netgears I have bought in stores, I am told by the respective support reps that, these router can handle only a single static ip and not multiple.

On Linksys forum, the moderator advised my to hang a WRT-4400N to a RV-0xx router which could handle multiple Static IPs. Since the RVs dont have gigabit ports, I will need a second gigabit switch it seems which make the whole thing very bulky to manage.

Is there an easy solution to all this ?

All I want to do is take the 5 static IPs given by SBC/Yahoo and assign them to 5 PCs so that they can be accessed publicly via internet just as was possible witn the 2Wire modem/router.

TIA

Shreeni

 

[thiggins]

Why are you changing from the 2wire router?

 

[SRITRI]

Something happened to them after the storms. Wireless speeds between connected PCs is slow and with the wired servers, a small file transfer chokes the whole router till I kill the transfer thru task manager.

When I use an alternate standby DSL modem hooked to a Linksys switch everything is OK. However the alternate DSL modem a Speedstream 5100 is unable to handle static IPs.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Need the business grade "gateways" from them. In the past, they used Netopia boxes. You would simply IP map the additional public IPs to the WAN interface of your firewalls, plugging the WAN NIC of the firewall into one of the LAN ports of the business gateway (such as the Netopia).

I'm not fond of the 2Wire units, on the clients we have that use the additional public IPs we'd use the Netopia units. With your own routers doing the NAT.

Has your 2Wire been replaced? They usually replace them if faulty (such as after a storm)

 

[SRITRI]

I did get the Linksys WRVS4400N. An "Exclusive Business Class" router. But upon calling support they tell me that only Enterprise routers have that capabality or they asked me to "downgrade" the old WRTs which can run the DD-WRT. Since i need the gigabit option do you know of any which can do this ?

 

[thiggins]

Don't get hung up on having a gigabit switch in the router. Select the router based on your multiple WAN IP needs and use a separate gigabit switch.

 

[SRITRI]

This is where I am having trouble understanding and need some hand-holding. If I buy another 2wire to handle the multiple IP, how do I hang a switch to it ? Do I need to buy a 8 port switch and then connect 4 LAN ports from the 2Wire to w individual ports of a switch and then use the remaing 4 ports on the switch to link other PCs ? I would be grateful if you could point me to any reading material or a writeup which you may have compiled.

Shreeni

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

The commonly used ISP supplied gateways (be they Netopia or 2Wire, or in the cable ISP world..the SMC units)...have 4x LAN ports. "Default" setting...whatever you plug into the LAN port that has its IP set to Obtain Auto/DHCP....will get a private IP address (usually class C..such as 192.168.1.xxx) from the routers DHCP, and be behind that NAT...and "share" the first public IP address of your account with any other devices plugged into with their IP set to obtain auto. Say this first static IP on your account is 64.65.66.67...what you go to whatismyip.com.that's what you'll see.

The business gateways will also do IP mapping. So if you take a PC, or the WAN interface of another router..and you set it up static with the next IP address of your IP block...say..64.65.66.68...and you plug it into one of the LAN ports of the Netopia/2Wire/SMC..they take on that public IP address. And whatever is behind them..gets their DHCP and NAT, and if they do a whatismyip.com..they show the "68" address.

Take a 3rd device..plug it into say..the 3rd port of the gateway...similar as above, but 64.65.66.69...same thing. If you need more than 4x devices..you could uplink a switch..and put a 4th and 5th in there.

You would not uplink the 4 ports of the 2Wire to the switch..you'd halt your network and have some fun watching all the lights go crazy. Just 1x port to uplink the gateway to the switch is needed.

"Buy" another 2Wire...won't the phone company replace it? Would be worth a call, try asking for a Netopia while on the phone.

 

[scotty]

On top of the recommendations already, there's a couple other ways you can handle multiple IP's from your ISP. You can try using an 'Edge' switch, which sits infront of your gateway / router. From here, you can add several different PCs/Servers/Routers to the switch and they each grab their own IP and deal with it on their own. This isn't necessarily appropriate in all cases, but it is a relatively common way you can take advantage of multiple IP's. It's fit the bill for me on several occasions.

Another (more common) method that can be used is 1:1 NAT. You need a router that supports 1:1 NAT to begin with (most small business grade routers have 1:1 NAT support). It essentially 'maps' public IPs to private addresses in your network (i.e. 62.63.64.65 --> 192.168.1.100, 62.63.64.66 --> 192.168.1.120), with or without firewall protection depending on your router.

At several sites I've managed, I've used 1:1 NAT the most. Makes life pretty easy when you have multiple public servers behind your internet connection (i.e. multiple web servers) and need multiple public IP's bound to them. All of the talk here about getting individual hosts behind the 2wire gateways to grab separate IP's should work though. But personally, I'm not a huge fan of the ISP-provided 2wire et al. devices to begin with, so they usually go out the window.

 

[SRITRI]

YeOldeStonecat : I had to buy a new one because AT&T told me they would'nt replace because I was a Small Business Customer and had chosen the seld-install option 4 years ago.

Scott : That was the reason I bought the Linksys WRVS-4400N reading "Business Class router" designation on the box and also the cost which was 235 USD after taxes. Well I am finding out the hard way that more money does not guarantee solution to my problem.

I have to look for/search for a router which can do 1:1 NAT or continue with the 2Wire.

Do you happen to know of a brand which can do this ?

Thanks to both of you for taking time to help.

Shreeni

 

[scotty]

I hear you, 'Business Class Router' does not necessarily guarantee much. But 'Business Class' can mean many different things to meany different people. 'Business Class' to a 20 person office is different than 'Business Class' to a 500 person office. I've seen 'business class' used in $50 home-user consumer level stuff.

As far as routers that will do 1:1 NAT, I know the popular Linksys RV0-series router will do it (used to have a fairly complex 1:1 setup at a client running an RV082), as will almost all Sonicwalls and Watchguards.

There's also some really good open-sourced based routers which pack a lot of features into a minimal price-tag. Pfsense and M0n0wall would be the most popular there. I quite like pfsense myself, as it has the features of most $2000 routers for free. It's easy to install and manage (all web based GUI), and will be as fast and reliable and any hardware you can throw it on. Throw pfsense and a couple nics into an old P3, P4 or celeron box and you have a hell of a router for extremely cheap.

 

[SRITRI]

Thanks Scotty. I have just downloaded pfSense and I will give it a try.

Shreeni

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

I second PFSense, been using it at home for a while..I run it on an old IBM Thinkpad T23 laptop with a PCMCIA NIC added. Just a 800 something MHz P3 with 256 megs.