Extremely confused......

[UncleMike1]

Hi, I'm trying to figure out how to add a router to a PC via USB-to-Ethernet adapter and keep it as a totally separate network from the on-board Ethernet connection provided from the server here at the company that I work for. We have about 16 CNC machines for cutting metals that have Serial-over-IP boxes attached to the RS232 ports for sending and receiving programs to and from the database that is on the server. The server has a pool of 30 IP addresses between 10.1.1.30 and 10.1.1.59 dedicated to the CNC machines. The problem with this is that the original intent was to NOT have any of the CNC boxes attached to the main network at all. We wanted to have an addition router hooked up to the PC that is used to send the programs via USB-to-Ethernet adapter just for the CNC boxes and utilizing the original 192.168.1.* router numbers. The intent was to set-up the router to assign the same IP addresses to the boxes every time by MAC address association eliminating the need to configure each Serial-over-IP box with a static IP. The original on-board network connection should not be disturbed in the way that it would act like the router isn't even hooked up to the PC at all. I guess my question would be "How would I go about setting this type of connection up, step by step?" The operating system for the PC is Windows 7 Professional and the router is an Asus AC2400 RT-AC87U. Any help would be greatly appreciated and I'm sorry if I may have posted this in the wrong section.

 

[UncleMike1]

WOW, No Insight?

 

[Nullity]

Try using some concise paragraphs and very clear questions. As I browse the forum for interesting topics of conversation, I usually skip walls of text and apparently I am not alone.

 

[L&LD]

WOW, No Insight?

WOW, no patience?

24 Hrs is considered polite before you bump your own thread.

 

[System Error Message]

I always thought that factory work used linux for the actual work and not windows. In linux you do not need a seperate usb to ethernet adapter. You do not need to configure a router, you can run automated configuration scripts based on the MAC address on the machines i.e set the IP address based on the increment of the mac address. If you're in such a hurry it sounds like as if you're asking us for quick help for something that should be paid for. it takes hours at best for a reply to a forum and some of us are on the other side of the world. US isnt the only country that uses forums.

Please try forming your questions in a more organised fashion and be patient. We do this in our free time and arent paid for this.

 

[Zirescu]

Assuming that I've actually understood what you've written you would setup the router to give out the DHCP addresses. Lan->DHCP Server. Under the Enable Manual Assignment set the option to Yes, and then add in the MAC addresses of your CNC RS232-Ethernet devices.

You can setup the USB-Ethernet for DHCP as well and also add it's MAC address to the manually assigned IP list.

 

[thiggins]

A diagram would be very helpful in figuring out what you are trying to accomplish.

 

[UncleMike1]

I would like to apologize for being impatient and not having my text broken up in to paragraphs without rambling on. I am making a diagram to show the desired flow and connections and will post it a few minutes. Thanks to everyone so far for the responses.

 

[UncleMike1]

The goal is to leave the server connection as-is and have it issue the dhcp ip to the pc as usual. Then the router attached to the same PC by way of the usb-to-Ethernet adapter with the ip address shown in the pic. All of the serial-over-ip boxes setup for dhcp and the router setup to assign the same ip to each box eveytime by way of mac address association.

Now, I want to be able to reach the server as usual and the serial-over-ip boxes connected to the router without changing networks on the pc manually each time. Is this even possible? I'm very unsure of what is the correct way to do this due to my lack of experience with networking. Thanks

 

[Zirescu]

Yeah, how I've suggest should work the way you've got it drawn. Any traffic that you have for the 192.168.2.x network will get routed there from the CNC station. I've got a similar setup, but I use just the one Ethernet NIC assigned to both networks and a switch in-between. But your way will physically keep things separate as well.

 

[UncleMike1]

Yeah, how I've suggest should work the way you've got it drawn. Any traffic that you have for the 192.168.2.x network will get routed there from the CNC station. I've got a similar setup, but I use just the one Ethernet NIC assigned to both networks and a switch in-between. But your way will physically keep things separate as well.

When I set-up everything the way that have it drawn the PC wants to connect to Network 2 which is the router and not the server (Network 1).

I also can't reach the router by web browser when switching networks manually back to Network 1. Hmmmmm

 

[Zirescu]

Are you accessing by name or IP? You might need to set the USB-Ethernet to a static IP address and leave out the default gateway.

 

[UncleMike1]

Are you accessing by name or IP? You might need to set the USB-Ethernet to a static IP address and leave out the default gateway.

I'm trying to access by IP. How would I change the USB-Ethernet to Static?

 

[Zirescu]

Control Panel->Network and Sharing Center -> Change adapter settings, Right-click on the Adapter and choose Properties. Scroll down in the list until you see Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IP), select it and then click on Properties.

Change the setting to: Use the following IP address.
Enter in the IP and Subnet mask address you want to assign and Click OK and then OK again.

You'll still want to add the Manual Entry on the Router side so that you don't end up with a potential IP address conflict.

Also make sure you're plugged into the LAN port of the Router and not the WAN.

 

[coxhaus]

Your drawing is not labeled as to Network 1 and Network 2. I assume Network 1 is company network. Something to try is to go into the TCPIPv4 settings. Go to properties and under general click advanced. Uncheck automatic metric, add a metric of 15 to Network 1. Do the same thing on the USB TCPIPv4 properties and add a metric of 25 for Network 2. I would turn off any TCPIP v6 on both. See if this helps. If is does not put it back the way it was.

You do not want a default gateway on the second NIC as there is no router. From the picture it looks like you are only using the router's LAN ports so the router is being used as a switch.

Another thing to try is at a command prompt type in route print. It should display both networks.

 

[UncleMike1]

Control Panel->Network and Sharing Center -> Change adapter settings, Right-click on the Adapter and choose Properties. Scroll down in the list until you see Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IP), select it and then click on Properties.

Change the setting to: Use the following IP address.
Enter in the IP and Subnet mask address you want to assign and Click OK and then OK again.

You'll still want to add the Manual Entry on the Router side so that you don't end up with a potential IP address conflict.

Also make sure you're plugged into the LAN port of the Router and not the WAN.

Your drawing is not labeled as to Network 1 and Network 2. I assume Network 1 is company network. Something to try is to go into the TCPIPv4 settings. Go to properties and under general click advanced. Uncheck automatic metric, add a metric of 15 to Network 1. Do the same thing on the USB TCPIPv4 properties and add a metric of 25 for Network 2. I would turn off any TCPIP v6 on both. See if this helps. If is does not put it back the way it was.

You do not want a default gateway on the second NIC as there is no router. From the picture it looks like you are only using the router's LAN ports so the router is being used as a switch.

Another thing to try is at a command prompt type in route print. It should display both networks.

Thanks for the quick response, I'm not at work right now but, I'm definitely going to give it the old college try tomorrow morning.

 

[System Error Message]

one thing you can do to prevent a conflict on windows is to disable default gateway or increase the gateway metric on the usb ethernet so windows doesnt use it to try and access the internet. If the network doesnt have a gateway than windows wont use it to try to access the internet. You will find this in TCPIPv4 settings as well under advanced. This way you dont need a static config you can have the router still use DHCP and control everything based on per device and bind the IPs to MAC.

 

[UncleMike1]

So, as of right now, I have the USB-Ethernet adapter (Network 2) configured to static IP of 192.168.2.1 and the router's IP changed to 192.168.2.2. The IP pool range in the router is set to 192.168.2.3 to 192.168.2.254, giving me plenty of addresses to choose from for my serial-over-ip boxes. I left the main server connection as-is (Network 1) and I still have internet access.

I can reach the router by IP in my web browser with no problem now. I did not change the metric settings for either network due to configuring the Network 2 adapter to static. The problem that I'm having now is that I can't set the router to reserve IP's from MAC on the Wireless side, only the LAN. Any ideas on this one? I would like to thank all of the members for the help to get me to this point. I'm a slow learner but the info is starting to make sense now.

Edit: I'm an idiot, lol. I didn't wait long enough for the router to reboot. The IP reservation works.

 

[UncleMike1]

If I did decide to share internet access from Network 1 to Network 2, how would I go about doing this?

 

[Zirescu]

My first thought was to use the built-in Internet Connection Sharing option, but based on what I read here on the windows help site, this won't work with your setup. It might be simpler to just connect a cable between the WAN port of the router to your network 1 switch/router and manually configure the Wan side for your network 1 IP range.

There's probably other ways to do it, but that was the simplest I could think of.