Obsidian

Basically, you're using the wrong device for what you want to accomplish. Your problem is the fact that the Netgear DG834G is a combo DSL Modem/router/ap. Your device will only act as a router for the DSL RJ11 interface, and is not a WAN RJ45 Ethernet to LAN RJ45 Ethernet. Your device will only function as a router for the DSL connection, and act as a hub for the LAN ports. Your best bet would be to go out to Best Buy, go to Newegg, or Amazon and just buy an actual router. Then simply mimic your MAC address on the new router (a common feature on most routers, but not on a DSL modems.) Things should then work perfectly. Hope this helps. Get the right device and what you want to do is very simple. ;)

Aye, the freezer method worked for me too more than once... at least long enough to get a few critical files off and then to make an image of the drive. One thing of note is you may want to put the HD in a ziplock freezer bag or even better a vacuum sealed bag.

It depends largely upon where the internet was cut off. If the current providers closed up shop and shut off their lines there really isn't much that could be done. Could/would likely then have to revert back to dialing into a server via a modem. Unless the person running this server had a lot of money for multiple phone lines and was willing to pay any potential long distance charges it would be a straight client/server setup. Basically, things would go back to the old dial-in BBS days. One user would call the server and download, post messages, read messages, mail, etc. Then that user would log off and another user would dial in and repeat the process. Then every day/week the server would then call another server and upload all the posts, messages, or files to the next server until all the servers sync up and the mail is delivered. Basically, it is that way now only with dedicated bandwidth so the latency is measures in milliseconds instead of days or weeks. If even modem communications over voice lines were restricted then things would go back even further to the point at which the internet would simply cease to be. A potential work around would be, as one person suggested, a large wireless network. But given the size and spaces involved in blanketing a country like the US it would be next to impossible. It would have massive holes in it and be inherently unreliable. Beyond that there is the potential for interference with other devices both intentional and unintentional. In my opinion, if a country wanted to "take down the internet"... yes it is possible. Anything that can be built can be destroyed. There will always be a means to get information in some form however. Even if it involves physically talking to a person to get your message delivered. Heck, centuries ago people would tatoo secrets on a slave's head and wait for the hair to grow over it. The latency would be measured in the months or years but there's always a way. All the internet truly does is bring the communication latency and interconnectedness to as close to a single point in space/time as possible. We used to live in a world that valued information, but today we put more value on what is actually done with the information rather than simply having it. Growing up spending hours trying to get any research done in books, magazines, newspapers, and card catalogs was tedious at best and simply having the information was a godsend. Today and preschooler can google theology and find copious amounts of information. Having the information doesn't matter anymore. It's what you do with it. Would I want to go back to a less connected world? No. Having access to the collective knowledge of the world at my fingertips puts each and every one of us in a position for advancing the human race by leaps and bounds previously unfathomable. ;)

Oy... I'm an id10t... Somehow I entirely missed that Smoothwall has VPN built in. I was way overthinking things before. I can simply give the 2003 server access to NIC A on the LAN. Totally remove the vSwitch and virtual network cards on the 172 range. Give Smoothwall access to both NIC A & B (A = Green, B = Red.) Use the VPN from Smoothwall and remove RRAS on the 2003 system and viola. So much simpler...

Aye... I agree with Sparda in what he says makes the most sense. That is unless you actually have a reason to stack the routers. Personally, it can/will likely cause more issues than it would solve especially if you are trying to share files between two ranges. The simplest way (& only way if the two routers are of the same default IP range, have been reset, & assuming they are both in fact uplinked to eachother and not acting as a pair of stacked routers) to reconfigure router B would be to just connect it directly to a laptop and manage it by itself. (The following assumes that the two routers are currently on different networks (ie. one behind another)). However, if you can't or don't want to you could always... 1) Set your local system (connected via LAN to Router B) with a static IP that was on Router B's network. 2) Log in to Router B. A) Disable DHCP (Router will likely want to save and possibly reboot) a) If you had to reboot wait for it to come back up and reconnect B) Reassign Router B's static IP address to an unused IP in the range of Router A (Save & Reboot router) 3) Change the Static IP on your local system back to DHCP 4) If you connected a LAN port on Router A to a LAN port on Router B everything should now be working fine. Essentially, here you are using Router B as an uplinked hub. As for using Router B as, "an extended wifi which would have the same SSID as the main router?" This is actually very simple to accomplish. In this scenario you are wanting to roam between AP's ( wireless Access Points.) 1) Set the SSID on Router A & B to the same name. 2) Make sure both A & B have the same encryption type and password 3) Set Router A & B on DIFFERENT channels (1, 6, or 11 ideally) 4) You should now be able to roam between the two AP's

Short answer is the 3G can't connect if encryption is required. However, the 3GS CAN as it does have hardware encryption. If you want a 3G to be able to connect you would have to downgrade to 3.0, but it wouldn't actually be encrypted...

Personally, I tend to keep parts a few years after their tech goes out of date. For instance, just this past week I threw away a couple VLB, ISA cards, a couple 5.25" floppy drives, a Bernoulli drive, and a partridge in a pear tree. I think in a few more years it may be time to throw away my Zip disks too. Fact is, as long as the tech is at least compatible I'd say to keep it. It's easier to have something and not need it than to need something you don't have. I dedicate ~3 medium sized moving boxes to old parts and put them somewhere out of sight but still accessible. If yo want a year... I think ~8-10 years is more than enough to keep things. If you haven't needed it by then chances are it's so far out of date there never will be. PS. Girlfriends are end user replaceable parts. However, high quality Girlfriend +1's are not as those put up with our idiosyncrasies. :)

I have a system running ESXi 4 server. This system runs Server 2003 as an Active Directory, DNS, & RRAS (VPN). It also runs Smoothwall. The system has 2x physical NIC's (A & B ) & 2x virtual NIC's (C & D.) Physical NIC: NIC A is connected to the internal 192.168.1.x network in Server 2003 NIC B is connected to the DSL modem on a 192.168.1.x network & is the Red interface in Smoothwall Virtual NIC: NIC C is connected to a virtual switch on a 172.16.0.x on Server 2003 (w/ Static IP) NIC D is connected to a virtual switch on a 172.16.0.x on Smoothwall's Green interface (w/ Static IP) Basically, the outgoing packets travel A >> C >> D >> B. The Server 2003 VM is setup as a gateway pointing all internet traffic to the 172 virtual network on NIC C. Smoothwall listens to NIC D on the same virtual 172 network and picks up the traffic. It then pipes out non-firewalled traffic out through NIC B on a new 192 network. Setting things up in this manner accomplishes a few things. For one, if ever there was an issue and I had to take the server offline I could simply plug the DSL modem into the switch temporarily to maintain internet connectivity (given it would be vulnerable during this time.) It also means that if the Smoothwall VM was compromised, the network of the virtual switch (172.16.0.x) would be exposed only then exposing the 2003 VM to attack. Plus, staggering the IP ranges at the very least would at best give most a headache attempting to navigate the various interfaces and mirrored, yet staggered, network ranges. The only other thing I could think of would be to forgo using the virtual NIC & virtual switch and strictly use the physical NIC's A & B. If I were to do this I would then run into an issue with RRAS and the VPN server. Since in this alternative scenario NICs A & B are operating in parallel on both Smoothwall & the 2003 VMs. Basically, A would be the internal network on 2003, and the Green interface on Smoothwall. NIC B would be the Red interface on Smoothwall, but would allow unfiltered traffic into the 2003 VM. This alternative does not seem viable to me as it essentially negates the point of running the Smoothwall to begin with. The first method does in fact work as it's running currently. However, I am hoping to get some feedback on if there is another more graceful method since this seems a bit kludgey to me, but I just don't see how I can make it all work securely without resorting to virtual NICs & virtual switches. However, it was the first thing I came up with that would allow Smoothwall to function as it should and protect all systems behind it.

Note: Got it figured out. I was working on it at 4am and was over-thinking things when I initially posted this. I've been working with ESXi 4.0 lately and have my domain controller setup running Server 2003 on one of the VM's. Actually, it's running AD, DNS, VPN & RRAS. I've been looking at running Smoothwall as another VM on the system. However, I'm trying to wrap my head around exactly how I'd need to setup the routing for 2003 server & smoothwall to play nice while running a VPN. It's be doable with a vSwitch unbound to a physical adapter and then adding a 2nd virtual NIC to each respective VM. Basically, just creating a vlan for it. Just curious if anyone has tried something similar and had any issues. TY~