Port forwarding

[kwong]

I replaced a Linksys with a RT-N66U about a week ago and have spent countless hours trying to get my dc++ music sharing program (EchoesHub) to operate with an 'active' connection (forward a port in router). I have spent 20 hours researching/experimenting.

I am running the latest Asus firmware (and also cleared the nvram via telnet, as per another older thread).

Nothing on the computer changed - I simply swapped out the routers and dc++ stopped working in active mode.

To configure an 'active' connection, you simply forward a port (using 1412) for both tcp/udp. I've done this many times with a couple routers.

I am sure that I am entering the forwarding information correctly (hit + and apply). The N66U port-forwarding log shows the port is forwarded. I can even see uPnP work -- if I do nothing in the router except enable uPnP, I see the port configured in dc++ appear in the N66U forwarding log when I turn on the program. Nevertheless, the port appears to be blocked. Even DMZ for the machine IP does not work. I have tried both DHCP and fixed IP.

The log in my ATT modem/router (set to full passthru) shows the packets failing to being received, and several web based port-checking programs show the port closed.

I hate to return the router since I am otherwise very happy with it.

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Bob

 

[kwong]

more information:

I just spent an hour with Asus support and I can't believe they are correct.
I have a 2Wire ATT modem/router upstream from the Asus and it is configured to pass everything. My previous Linksys, also downstream from the ATT router forwarded ports correctly.

EXT IP > ATT ROUTER > 192.168.1 64 > ASUS Router > 192.168.0 x

Asus support insists that the WAN side of my Asus router needs to be my public/external IP. Of course this is silly, right? The WAN side of my Asus is the LAN side of my ATT. They tell me to configure my ATT as a bridge (I do not believe I can) or to configure the ASUS as an access point, which seems like an absurd thing to have to do.

SO, is this router incapable of forwarding ports with an upstream router? And how could that be?

Please!!! Any ideas?

 

[jdabbs]

The 2wire modem/router certainly sounds like the culprit. Manually create a port forwarding assignment on the 2wire router and check it again. If that works, take a look at how the 2wire router is configured. Wouldn't surprise me if the Asus router WAN IP differs from the original Linksys router, or treated as a different object (with a corresponding difference in applied ruleset).

 

[RMerlin]

more information:

I just spent an hour with Asus support and I can't believe they are correct.
I have a 2Wire ATT modem/router upstream from the Asus and it is configured to pass everything. My previous Linksys, also downstream from the ATT router forwarded ports correctly.

EXT IP > ATT ROUTER > 192.168.1 64 > ASUS Router > 192.168.0 x

Asus support insists that the WAN side of my Asus router needs to be my public/external IP. Of course this is silly, right? The WAN side of my Asus is the LAN side of my ATT. They tell me to configure my ATT as a bridge (I do not believe I can) or to configure the ASUS as an access point, which seems like an absurd thing to have to do.

SO, is this router incapable of forwarding ports with an upstream router? And how could that be?

Please!!! Any ideas?

No router can forward ports if it's not fronting the Internet. You would need each router to be able to forward ports to the device that sits behind it. If your modem is also configured as a router, then it means the packets will never even reach your Asus router.

 

[kwong]

Thank you for the reply jdabbs. Your are correct and I now have it working. The solution is not without some voodoo:

Yes the ATT router DMZ configuration is a based on the downstream router's MAC address, so the old forwarding setting on the ATT was not working. However, I had seen that and 'correctly' set the ASUS MAC address as the dmz device. Everything looked correct but it did not forward. I noticed that the "LAN status" for the ASUS device was NOT enabled. Yet another power cycle of the ASUS resulted in that status now being 'enabled'. Now the ATT router had once again tossed the dmz settings.. I again set the Asus MAC address for DMZ and for a moment, everything worked (ports forwarded correctly). Then I lost all internet (touched nothing, I swear). A power cycling of both routers fixed that and I still have the forwarded port.. Voodoo I tell ya!

The one remaining question is: The ASUS router NOW shows the WAN address as my external public IP. Simply specifying DMZ to the ASUS MAC actually set the LAN IP of the ATT router equal to my external IP. I do not understand why simply forwarding ports (dmz) would turn the router into a bridge (terms may be wrong). I still expected the ATT LAN IP to be 192.168.1.64 and the ASUS WAN to be the same. In other words, it is now:

EXT IP > ATT ROUTER > EXT IP > ASUS Router > 192.168.0 x

thanks again,
bob

ps: thanks Merlin. I assumed that port forwarding was completely limited to passing packets from WAN-to-LAN of each so-configured device. Makes no sense to me that the WAN side MUST be a public IP.