I have Roadrunner cable modem on a computer in the living room.
Now I’ve got a computer in my bedroom that I want the internet on, so I went & bought a D-Link DI-604 broadband router & some ethernet cable today…
When I got to the step in setup that required me to enter a whole bunch of IP address information supposedly “provided to me by my ISP”, I realized that, well, it wasn’t provided. It tells me to contact my ISP if I don’t have that information, but I don’t want to do that, as I’m quite certain they’ll want more money from me.
The info I need is: WAN IP address, WAN subnet mask, WAN gateway address, primary DNS address, and secondary DNS address.
Is there any way to find this out without talking to Roadrunner?
There should be a “Obtain IP Automatically” or something to that extent. I’m going to guess that you already had broadband on one computer. You’ll basically just use the same settings from that computer in your router.
Oh, and BTW things like your WAN IP address will change from time to time (could be every couple of hours, or every couple of days), so you really can’t enter the WAN IP into the router unless you have a static IP, which you more then likely don’t.
OK. I’m assuming that you can still connect with the original machine. Do so. Then, go to Start-> Settings, right-click on “Network connections” and select “Open”.
[I’m assuming XP here, if you’ve got something else, these instructions will vary slightly.]
You’ll get a “network connections” window that has one or more “LAN or High-Speed Internet” icons in it. Pick the one that corresponds to your ethernet card (probably called “Local Area Connection”), right-click it, and select properties. (If you guess wrong, just do this to the rest until you find it.)
In the “This connection uses the following items” list box, select “Internet Protocon (TCP/IP)” which is usually at the bottom, and click “Properties.”
Ready? Here we go:
If “Obtain an IP address automatically” is set, you either don’t have or aren’t using your static IP address. Otherwise:
In the box labelled “Use the following IP address:”
WAN IP Address = IP Address (in the box)
WAN Subnet Mask = Subnet Mask (in the box)
WAN Gateway address = Default Gateway (in the box)
Primary and secondary DNS are listed in the lower box, unless you’ve got “Obtain DNS Server address automatically” selected. In that case, open an XP command window, (Start->Run, type “cmd”, hit return) and give the command “ipconfig” and they’ll be in there.
This gets you halfway – with this information you can set up your new router. I’m going to presume that the instructions you’ve got will be enough to get you the rest of the way. If not, let me know.
OK, I think your instructions may have gotten me indirectly to the information I need, but just to be sure, I’m going to post it here before trying it.
“Obtain IP address automatically” and “Obtain DNS server address automatically” were both selected, so I decided to pull my hair out, because I know I’ve got static IP (I’ve seen it logged several times and it’s always the same). Then for some reason I left-clicked on the same thing I’d just right-clicked on, and it brought up a little info thingy, under which there were two tabs: General and Support. I clicked Support, it said “Internet Protocol TCP/IP” and under that, “Address Type: Assigned by DHCP”, and then an IP address, subnet mask, and default gateway… so I’m like “whee!” and I click on the button below that which reads “Details”, and there I find a list including Physical Address, IP address, subnet mask, default gateway, DHCP server, Lease obtained/expired dates, and three DNS server numbers.
Please tell me I’ve outsmarted the soulsucking cable beast-monsters. >_<
This does not mean you have a static IP. Could also mean the road runner does not change your IP often. I would suspect that this is the case because you say your settings are:
Which means the cable company dynamically assigns your IP address.
You are outsmarting yourself, making the setup much more complicated then it needs to be.
Chances are high that you do not have static IP service from RoadRunner, and if you did, you would be paying extra for it. And even if you do, you aren’t using it, you are using DHCP (which assigns your IP address dynamically and automatically).
You simply need to go back through the DLink Setup Wizard, and select “Dynamic IP Address” instead of “Static IP” and all will be well.
And no, you should have no reason to contact the cable company. I must note, however, that many cable companies ISP services map the DHCP assignments to the MAC address of the NIC. This was probably configured when you first setup your cable modem services, and you may need to utilize the “MAC Cloning” capability of the DLink. You can enter that information on the screen after selecting “Dynamic IP Address” in the wizard.
sigh I don’t get it then… how come my internet connection worked before I ran the setup wizard for the router, which I ran through for dynamic IP just to see if that was it, but not after?
besides… I’ve had this service for over a month, and the IP address that’s logged has never changed. does dynamic IP often go that long without changing?
Yes. Dynamic (DHCP) addresses are given out with a “lease time.” You get to hold it for that period of time, as long as you stay connected. Often, if you log out and reconnect with a machine with the same MAC (Ethernet) address, you’ll get the same address back. These leases can be as short as a few minutes, or as long as a few weeks, and are commonly 1 - 7 days.
However, most systems will “renew” the lease for you if you’re still logged in when it expires, or sometimes even just intermittently. In that case, DHCP addresses are more or less permenant as long as you use your connection fairly frequently, and nothing happens on the ISP end to cause it to loose it’s DCHP memory. I’m on a static IP now because I run a small business and my web server MUST stay at the same address, but in my “consumer” days, I used to keep DHCP addresses for 4-6 months routinely.
Try setting up everything as dynamic (the DLink router, the machine connected to it, everything). Insure that you’ve got the DLINK set up to provide dynamic addresses to the computers as well (behind NAT)*. Also make SURE that you’ve got the WAN cable in the WAN input for the DLink (or else you’re dead from the start).
Now turn EVERYTHING (cable modem, router, computer) off. Leave them that way for at least 2 minutes, then power them back up again in that order (cable modem, router, computer) with a couple minutes between them.
Once you get this working, I’d suggest that you go to local static addresses (i.e. behind your router) rather than dynamic ones, because it makes several things easier (setting up DMZ or port forwarding, local servers, etc.) later – but for now, just make it dynamic all the way.
OK! I think I’m getting somewhere.
I went through the setup wizard again, doing the exact same thing I did last night, with only one difference: the cable between my second computer and the router was not plugged in.
This time it worked! I didn’t lose connection!
Sooooooooo… now I am going to plug in my other cable… and hopefully the world does not implode.
As far as I know, you cannot get static IPs from RoadRunner - even if you want to pay extra for them - unless you get one of their pricey “business” accounts. Having said that, I must be one of the their only customers on this node, because I’ve had the same IP address since the middle of April.
Setting up a router with RoadRunner should take less than 5 minutes - I’m not being a smart-ass here, it just shouldn’t. I think the problem you’re having is related to what TimeWinder said - turning off (or power cycling) your modem and router.
I recently bought a Microsoft 802.11(g) router because 802.11(g) is much faster than 802.11(b). Anyway, setting up the basic parts of it are exactly the same as any other router. I set mine up manually - with “obtain IP address automatically” for the WAN side and entering the same IP address I had used for my old router on the LAN side. Everything appeared to go off well, but no Internet. Having set up a gagillion routers at my previous job, I pulled the power plug from my cable modem… waited 30 seconds… and powered it on again… and everyone had Internet.
I did the exact same thing I did last night, minus that one cable being plugged in, and everything’s working like a charm. working internet on both ends now!! wickeddddddddddddd omfghappylikewhut
and now I feel uber-dumb for getting so frustrated & making totally wrong assumptions… #_#;;;